Preschool intake woes
Published September 5th, 2007 in Mostly a picture, School work, Visual aids.
Fig. A. In which Baba elbows her way into the state’s somewhat limited parental imagination. (Alternative? How ’bout “Parent/guardian 1″ and “Parent/guardian 2″? Has a nice Thing 1 and Thing 2 ring to it. Plus it works for EVERYONE. That’s what I, an honest taxpayer, like to see in my state-generated paperwork.)
Fig. B. In which we have to cop to the sad, sad truth about the potty training campaign.
Fortunately we also had the opportunity to wax on about our kiddle’s personality: “Radiant! Shimmering! She’s ready for her MacArthur genius grant, Mr. DeMille! Nary a fly in her ointment– er. Well. We’d go on about her few flaws but we ran out of space on the line!”
It aaaaalmost made up for the double indignity.
Lesbian Dad is written by a parent who answers to the name "Baba" and works toward a world in which amor does indeed vincit omnia. 
I’ve been in NYC for a few days and you have been very busy toiling away here.
So, how was the first day of preschool? Or has it not happened yet?
Zeca started on Tuesday and, last night, told me that the best part of her day was learning not to “destroy other people’s work”. This is an important lesson…especially for her!
Toil and trouble, cauldron bubble!
First day of preschool is kind of happening with a whimper, rather than a bang. The beloved is herself afar, with the lil’ peanut, for a singing gig in OMAHA NEBRASKA. Which is very far from here, by the way, in case anyone didn’t notice. We’re only at hour 24 since her departure, but LORDY is it quiet. No wonder people kept looking sideways at us when we were talking about a second kid!
But so. She wants to witness the First Day of Preschool for our first kiddle, and so the lil’ monkey and I have just dropped in and hung out for a coupla hours (which we also did once over the summer). Um, with me loitering like a schmuck in the background. I should have had my wits about me and told her I’d need to step out for a moment and I’d be back in an hour or so. Instead I asked whether she’d be okay with that. Silly me, handing her the reigns again. No duh, she said “I’d rather you be here with me, Babi.”
I couldn’t go back on my word, and thus hoped my presence would at least serve as a cautionary note to other first-timer parents. Since it certainy was slowing/prolonging the girlie’s adjustment process. I thought about making a “Dunce” sign and hanging it around my neck, but that would have triggered the need to explain the word to budding readers, and as a teacher type I couldn’t brook that word worming into their vocabularies so early.
All of which to say: Cold Turkey Full Day will be Monday, the day the beloved returns from the Great Plains and our brood is whole again. I promise to file a full report, unless of course it’s a debacle and reflects poorly on us.
Oh come on now…don’t your loyal readers deserve to FINALLY read something that reflects poorly on you
Okay, yesterday, we were sitting on a bench eating pastries, and I pointed and said, “Hey! Look! Haley’s Comet!” And the lil’ monkey’s head whirled around to look, and I ate a huge bite out of what she had left. Sure, she cried when she realized what happened, but she got over it. It’s a tough world out there and it’s my job to prepare her.
I’m de-lurking here to ask you a question. Do you have any advice for the other parents in a preschool, to make it easier on the children of lesbians?
There’s a little girl in my daughter’s preschool who has a Mommy and a Maman (uhm, it’s a French preschool). I have to say that I was SO happy to find this out, because I want my daughter exposed to more diverse people than *I* was. Because I’ve found myself ‘handicapped’ later on in life, because I have a hard time knowing the right thing to say and do.
I’ve been friendly with the Moms, I’ve pointed out to my daughter about different families, and I hope that since they’re starting so young that it will be accepted as entirely normal, just like the different skin colours and different names.
Thanks for your help. I really don’t want to commit any faux pas.
Sheri
PS - I love the photos of your little family, that little guy is just TOO CUTE (he’s been giving me the baby fever!)
Thank you for asking this, Sheri Behri! And welcome! I got so ding-dong prolific in my answer that I just had to redirect it to a post, proper. Thank you thank you for asking. I’ll bet other gals reading will chime in, too (or at least I hope so). Stay tuned for the post-length response!
Oh, and meanwhile: The baby fever! I love it! Here, here’s another. He’s lookin’ at YOU, Sheri, or perhaps rather your ovaries. (Cue Peggy Lee.)
I work at an adoption agency that places with a lot with same-sex couples and all of our paperwork says “Parent 1″ and “Parent 2″. It makes so much more sense all the way around - and I love that you added guardian too. My daughter is only 9 months old, so I haven’t had the pleasure of filling out any forms that identify me as her parent or ask about her poop. Can’t wait to see what the forms say when I do…
Rocky started preschool today, too. We were lucky - many of the people in our neck of the woods have ACTUALLY SEEN SAME-SEX PARENTS! Live! So the teacher and parents at the open house hardly blinked an eye. One mama did give us the “wha-? OH…” look, and then looked away, the way the uncomfortable uninitiated often do. Win them over, one smile and handshake at a time.
There you have it, sister Blue Ox. One smile and one handshake at a time.
And Justpowers: there is no fig leaf on the preschool intake form. Perhaps since they do go where our kids have gone before, if you catch my drift. Sigh. I don’t think I would have guessed there’d be so much exposure, with this kid stuff. But unless we lead the entirety of our lives in a survivalist bunker, a lot our parenthood — both its successes and its not-so-successes — is rather on display, in the person of our kids.