I would have thought I would be dreading today, but I’m approaching it with a more indifferent attitude than I would have imagined possible. Then again, let’s see how the day goes.
It’s the first day of school for first graders. Had everything gone according to a much better plan, Colin would be starting his school career today.
Now, there are all kinds of reasons to point out that, even if the cancer hadn’t reoccurred and he had learned to live with the food pump, that this might not have been the year he started school. There could have been developmental delays. But, in a world where he grew up normally, this would have been his big day.
The first day of school is, of course, a big deal almost everywhere. But Germans go a little bit nuts about it. And I’m told the eastern Germans take it up a notch further, likely because, during the communist era, so many family events centered around the church calendar – Christmas, Easter, first communions – were suppressed. The first day of school thus turned into a much bigger event. Schools open up on Saturday and there’s a welcome program after which the kids get to check out their new classroom and meet their teacher and classmates. Afterwards, each child gets a ridiculously large cardboard cone full of toys and candy and then heads home to a family party centered entirely on him or her. I’ve seen neighbors renting clowns, ponies and bouncy castles for this day. It’s a big deal.
Now, maybe this is all going to be subdued this year due to Covid-19. All the rest of the kids have been in school since Monday and Berlin has already had to shut down, at least briefly, eight schools because of coronavirus fears or outbreaks. I can’t imagine that they’re going to have the first day program as extravagantly as they have had it in the past. But it’s still a day worth noting.
I have to work most of it. And I’m bracing myself to watch the two boys across the street come home with their cones. I’m bracing myself for what I imagine might be a larger family gathering at the other neighbor’s house. I’m just bracing myself.
The picture at the top of this post. It came up in my Facebook memory feed a few days ago. It’s from 2018, when every morning was a negotiating session about which superhero figures he could take to day care. It was a month before I went to Australia and four months before the start of his last hospitalization process. It’s hard having these memories shoved at you by Facebook, but it’s also liberating. I do know that, when it came up, I refused to let my laptop refresh that page for the better part of a week, because I didn’t want the picture to go away, even though it’s also easily accessible in my photo archive. I suppose I’m just realizing that I have to hold on to the memories, but I have to let the world move on as well. Eight hours into this particular day, I’m holding on OK.