Let me back up here and explain. Since school ends before Father’s Day, the kids made premature “My Dad is Great” cards that they then brought home yesterday. The card is a kind of a Mad Libs-type thing, where the child completes sentences that are already written out. The school did the same thing for Mother’s Day, when it was determined that my child knows me not at all. While I can lovingly describe every one of Aura’s favorite books, frequent sayings, and still-chubby knuckles, the kid is aware of zilch about me. Case in point:

Okay, so I can let that one slide. I figured out the math and this height-weight combination gives me a BMI of -20. She always was a good daughter.

However.

Somewhere, wherever it might live and assuming we even have one, the mop is doubled over in hysterics. Of course, I’m too busy WATCHING TV to notice. Just sitting there, watchin’ away in my nice green shirt.

Anyway. The thing Adam takes issue with on his card is this:

Now, anyone who has read this blog for a while probably remembers that Adam’s hobby is cocktails. Yes, he likes to drink them, but what he really, really likes is researching them and creating them and talking ad nauseam about them until all the dinner guests in the house stumble blindly for the door and SILENCE AHH THE BLESSED SILENCE.

Needless to say, Aura has picked up quite a bit of cocktailian knowledge from Adam, sitting at the counter as she does most nights when he is concocting his latest creation. She can tell you what a jigger is, she can describe how the homemade rhubarb bitters taste, she can expound upon the virtues of a julep strainer.

So that’s what Aura meant by “drinks” on the card. The problem? She told the teacher to write “cocktails” but the teacher told me “I couldn’t bring myself to write it” and then I innocently told Adam that and then HOLY HELL WHAT IS THE WOMAN’S PROBLEM IT’S NOT LIKE I’M A DRUNK I JUST APPRECIATE A WELL-RESEARCHED COCKTAIL. COCKTAILCOCKTAILCOCKTAIL WHERE’S THE DIRTY WORD THERE? GRRR GROWL MANLY AND TIPSY BEATING OF CHEST

But then there was this:

I mean, there really is no way around this. Aura explained to us that she couldn’t remember “rum” at the time and so she went with “wine.” I’m a little surprised the teacher didn’t change this to “fairy nectar,” but I suppose three hours in a classroom with eight four-year-olds can wear down even the strongest of convictions.

The best I can do at this point is convince Adam not to bring his cocktail shaker to the graduation tomorrow, which he is threatening to do just out of spite.

Huh. On second thought, maybe I should be the one to show up drunk.

Luckily, there’s nothing better for defrosting a dormant blog than a healthy dose of letting-off-steamishness. Extra luckily, I have just the subject. And her name is Suzy, or it wouldn’t be if I was foolhardy enough to use her real name, which may or may not rhyme with littleshit.

Suzy, Presented in Three Stages

Suzy is a little girl in Aura’s preschool class. Since she was in another classroom last year, Aura only just met her in September, and what a meeting it was. Suzy was pronounced a GREAT GIRL. Also, SO FUN. Also also, VERY FUN TO PLAY WITH.

I examined Suzy and I agreed: She looked like an absolute doll. I watched her run around the school’s front yard with Aura and I got all non-Kate-like mushy. They would be each other’s closest confidante! There would be sleepovers and yearbook co-editorships and eventually weddings, or at least Suzy’s, since Aura would have been locked in her room permanently once she reached pubescence! But still! Videoconferencing!

One day, Aura announced that Suzy was one of her Best Friends. I smiled and said I was glad. Plus I maybe picked up a bridesmaid dress catalog, just, you know, in case.

By December, there seemed to be less talk of Suzy. On the drive home from school, if I asked Aura who she played with, it was only sometimes Suzy. Apparently, Suzy was often busy playing with “the boys,” in the “toy couch area,” thus proving that YES, THEY REALLY DO START THAT YOUNG.

One unseasonably warm afternoon before Christmas, I once again watched the kids running on the front lawn. My eyes narrowed and my heart broke a little as I watched Suzy pair off with another child, Aura halfheartedly chasing her around before giving up entirely.

Then one day Aura announced, “I was lucky today, because Suzy sat next to me at snacktime.”

“No, sweetie,” I replied. “Suzy was lucky to sit next to YOU!”

That night, I repeated the story to Adam. He started drumming his fingers on the counter and glaring at random things. (The poor wall clock. It was fixed with the Icy Stare of Paternal Displeasure. It has never told time the same way again.) (Actually, it hasn’t told time correctly since 2005. However. The look. It was icy.)

“Don’t worry yet,” I said comfortingly. “I’m sure Suzy will come around.”

I think you see where I’m going here. The Suzy situation has not greatly improved with the advent of a new year. To be fair, this does not seem to bother Aura all that much anymore. She plays with the other kids and she amuses herself and she didn’t even appear that offended when explaining that “Suzy was playing with the castle and I tried to play with her but she said no, not now, it was her turn and that she was the only one who gets to play with the princess.”

“Oh, taking turns!” I chirped, diverting her attention with candy and lavish toys or maybe a pony, one can’t be expected to remember every such thing. “Nothing wrong with that! I’m glad you were so patient.”

“ONLY SHE GETS TO PLAY WITH THE PRINCESS?” I roared to Adam that night. “WHO DOES THAT LITTLE NO-GOOD PIECE OF PRESCHOOL BOY-BAIT THINK SHE IS, TALKING TO OUR DAUGHTER THAT WAY?”

He nodded, looking slightly taken aback.

“SO WHAT IF THERE IS ONLY ONE PRINCESS IN THE CASTLE?” I continued at top volume, spitting a little in my indignation. “PLUS. SHE LOOKS MORE LIKE THE PRINCE TYPE, ANYWAY.”

I’m not sure what that last bit was about, but I do know it made crystal-clear maternal sense when I screamed it.

I’ve calmed down a bit since then, and recording my thoughts here has helped immensely. In fact, it’s even given me insight.

Tomorrow? I’m tripping Suzy with my Uggs. There is more than one way to use sheepskin, you know.

But then the father of a kid in another classroom at Aura’s preschool came in with a very exotic-looking guitar and played it for all the kids. To hear Aura tell it, his performance was very well received. Perhaps not as well-received as that of the mother who was a dentist and came in to demonstrate how cavities form via a full-on puppet show, but still. The guitar was exotic. I’d say it was a didgeridoo, except I know that a didgeridoo is not a guitar, EVEN IF IT SHOULD BE.

It totally could have been a didgeridoo.

Anyway, the form was sent home again this week and I’ll be damned if we’re not filling it out this time. Except all I seem to like to do these days is read. And eat. Neither of those seems like a preschool showstopper, unless I could learn to eat books, in which case I am CERTAINLY not wasting that skill on a bunch of four-year-olds.

Tonight, frustrated by my talentless existence, I stomped into the living room to blame Adam, a strategy that has never failed me in the past. “Aura’s school wants us to share our talents,” I announced, leaning on the arm of the sofa. “So what do you want to share?”

“Hmmm?” Adam answered, eyes still glued to the television.

“YOU. A TALENT. GIVE ME ONE.” I snapped, the stress of having none myself beginning to gnaw at me.

Adam finally looked away from the screen, turning to look in my direction. “Why do I have to share a talent? I’m at work all day, anyway. You should share a talent.”

“Well,” I said, trying to buy time. “Well, I can’t seem to think of just one at the moment.”

“Let’s see,” Adam said, starting to really get into it. “You could tell the kids how you like to…huh.” Breaking eye contact, he started picking at a loose string on the sofa arm.

“Yes?” I replied icily, giving him the same look I gave him when he bought me a pregnancy pillow for our first wedding anniversary and told me it was a romantic thing to do and then used the pillow himself for the subsequent seven months.

“Uh! Hmm!” Adam went into full-on panic mode, frantically running his fingers over the TiVo remote as if tapping out a certain code would transport him anywhere but the living room. Then he looked back up at me. “I know! You can tell them all about reading!”

I stared.

“You know, reading! How to do it, and…how to do it even better!” Adam smiled, obviously pleased with himself.

I threw the form at him so hard that I think I gave him a paper cut, or at least I hope so, since that is definitely what I was aiming for. Then I Googled didgeridoo lessons, found a local teacher, and signed him up.

Sucker.

Considering this is her second year of preschool, one might think that I would have wrapped my brain around the concept of having a kid and then watching that kid go to school. But it still seems a tad foreign to me. For years, all I’ve been hearing is KEEP AN EYE ON YOUR CHILD and FEED HER ORGANICS and BEWARE BAD INFLUENCES.

Yet here I am, releasing her into a classroom run by almost-strangers, where she will nosh on undoubtedly pesticide-laced goldfish crackers and learn all about the seedy underbelly of Yo Gabba Gabba, the one show that creeps me out too much to TiVo.

I felt a bit adrift after I walked out of Aura’s classroom, so I left the car at the preschool and went for a walk, since now and then I find myself once again falling for those scientists and their studies that say exercise has benefits. It was an okay walk, during which I stopped into the grocery store and bought Adam this wasabi-horseradish cheddar he really likes. But when I was almost back to the car, a wild turkey starting chasing me down the street and when I breathlessly threw myself into the car I tossed the cheese on top of the preschool information forms I’m supposed to return and now the forms smell like horseradish and the driver’s side door has turkey-beak pecking marks.

From now on, I’m going straight home after drop-off. I might even fire up the old laptop and research how to trap crazed wild fowl. Talk about things that should be taught in preschool. GEEZ.

“I just want her/him to play and have fun!” was a common refrain. “It’s all about socialization and forming new attachments!” was another.  I think I may have even offered up some load of crap along the lines of ”I want Aura to be able to exhibit the confidence she shows at home in other environments!” (Even I couldn’t stomach that one, though. I think I apologized for making the world’s most eye-rollingest statement shortly afterwards, then burned all my parenting magazines in a really huge bonfire. Or at least I hope I did.)

Look at her, exhibiting.

Yes, we were a thoughtful group. And we really did want to find schools that focused more on play than structured academics. But while we were all expressing what we kind of wanted, none of us said what we really wanted: NAPS. We wanted a school that offered so many opportunities for play, such thoroughly exhausting activities, that our kids would come home, throw back a lunchtime bowl of mac and cheese, then promptly march themselves straight to bed, where they would sleep for approximately four hours.

So far, the preschool we chose last fall has worked out well in all regards, naps included. Aura loves the place, has grown much more comfortable interacting with other children and being away from me, and shows a lot more confidence in physical activity. I feel great when I drop her off those two mornings each week, knowing that she is safe and cared for and entertained.

But. I’m starting to feel a little squirmy by just how much playing there is. Should preschool really be this fun? Shouldn’t it involve a bit more about numbers beyond 10? How many times does Aura have to hear about shapes and colors and sharingblahblahblah before she gets to take a stab at writing an actual letter? How about telling time? Identifying coins? TACKLING QUANTUM PHYSICS?!?

I’m not sure why I’m suddenly so fixated on the academic aspect of preschool. We already work with Aura at home on writing and phonics and all the other stuff that will soon lead her to book her own early-childhood, I-hate-my-parents therapy sessions. (Which I will have to drive her to, of course, making the entire thing so much more inconvenient.)

Honestly, it was last week’s mittens theme that really got me started on this academics tangent. The kids painted paper mittens, brought mittens for Show and Tell, read books about mittens. I suspect they would have had mittens for snack, too, if the teachers could have figured out that one.

I admit: I'd wear these.

All I could think of: Why mittens? Why not gloves? At least with gloves you can count up to five, or ten, or maybe learn about the names of each finger. I mean, seriously: Why have I sung along to ”Where is Thumbkin?” 650 times if not for Aura to be able to show off her knowledge of Ringman and Pointer and Pinky? With mittens, you get, what? A thumb? A bunch of other fingers mashed together? Unimpressive.

Yet I’m thinking this is one of many times when I need to back off and forget about it. Preschool is preschool is preschool. And for all I know, last week’s foray into the world of mittens led to profound Circle Time discussions on warmth and seasons and perhaps the utter frustration of global warming.

Plus Aura already knows the one word that counts the most:

Before I name the winner, allow me to observe how many of you have failed to appreciate the giveaway concept.  With a giveaway, you get something FREE. Like, I have something, then I give it. Away. To you. For FREE. I am flummoxed by how many people viewed the post, yet did not comment. My only hypothesis is that most people are not as cheap as I am. You could have a, a…tractor giveaway and I’d comment. I have absolutely no desire whatsoever for a tractor, but a free tractor? I NEED IT. GIVE ME THE FREE TRACTOR.

Anyway, I really am grateful to all readers, even those who do not fully appreciate getting something for nothing. And perhaps next time I won’t even ask you to say something witty or makes guesses about movie stars. I’ll just ask you to offer up your middle name or favorite color.  And when it becomes the Lamest Giveaway Ever, we will all know who to blame.

Yes. So. The winner, as determined by the ever-so-helpful True Random Number Generator, is #15, Cavalier, who shrewdly named Mel Gibson as a probable Golden Globe drunk. Excellent guess, Cavalier, and congrats.

Shall we take a moment to consider who Cavalier will soon be welcoming into his/her home, as soon as I get that DVD out the door?

None other than the delectable Stanley Tucci, one of Julie & Julia‘s brightest selling points. I find the diminutive Stanley very compelling. Not in a dirty-dreams kind of way, necessarily, but more the talent-and-skill kind of way. He’s like Napoleon, without all that hand-tucked-in-jacket, island-exile crap.

That about sums up this giveaway Friday. As we head into the three-day weekend, with its chance of more freakin’ snow, let me educate those of you unfamiliar with the wilds of Greater Boston on how we like our snowmen:

That’s right.  We like ‘em made out shaving cream. We also eschew snowmen with wide-set eyes, much preferring them to have twoeyessquishedtogetherreallytightly. Arms, eh. As long as they have two of them, somewhere in the general vicinity of their enormous rectangular nose, we’re good.

Finally, snowpersons with rosebud mouths or pouty lips have zero chance for survival.  You want to make it in metro Boston, you stick out your pipecleaner tongue. It’s like the middle finger you would have if the preschool teacher didn’t frown upon things like that.

“Yes, yes. Sure,” I replied and propelled her towards her light-up toothbrush. “Did you put on your light-up shoes yet? I think they’re over….OH NO. IS TODAY SHOW AND TELL?”

I swear to you, at this school it’s always Show and Tell Day. If it’s not the morning you’re supposed to bring something red to school, it’s the day you’re expected to bring in a photo from a family trip, or of an animal that hibernates, or maybe a picture you drew of a family trip during which there was an animal hibernating.

I have the vague sense that’s there a learning opportunity involved somehow, but have yet to nail that down. I can tell you that Aura has recently begun holding items on both sides, by their edges, sort of like a spokesmodel. “See?” she will say. “I am SHOWING this to you.”  Assuming she drops the narration and agrees not to scatter her fruit-leather wrappers all over the set, I’m thinking she could audition to be one of those gals on The Price is Right.  Learning opportunity be damned; our preschool offers career prep skills. Wait. Let’s initial-cap that: Our preschool offers Career Prep Skills. There. Much better.

Granted, there may be more to Show and Tell than meets the eye. But I wouldn’t know this, since asking the usually talkative Aura to describe the process is something akin to finding Atlantis, or perhaps expecting me to jog for any reason besides being held at knifepoint. There is an…insouciance in her descriptions that one can only assume is meant to drive me completely and then totally over the edge.  Allow me to demonstrate.

Me: Hey baby! How was school? Tell me what you saw at Show and Tell today!

Aura: Everyone brought something green.

Me: I know that, silly. That’s why Mommy was saying bad words this morning while we did a last-minute search of your play-food bin for pretend lettuce or limes, remember?  

Aura: Yes. Everyone brought in green things.

Me: Okaaay.  <knowing that friend Lee brought in Tinkerbell> So what did your friend Lee bring?

Aura: Something green.

Me: YES. IT WAS GREEN. <stealing quick drink from pocket flask> Was it maybe…Tinkerbell?

Aura: Yep. Tinkerbell. And you know what, Mommy?

Me: What, sweetie? <excited intake of breath>

Aura: She was green.

I rest my case.

But this is about me. Me me me.

The day before Aura started preschool (which she does love and is adjusting to splendidly and is therefore really an all-around perfect child, just as I suspected), I made a promise to myself. Every Tuesday and Thursday, as I marched Aura into school, I would be at least one thing: showered. I wouldn’t guarantee  myself ironed clothes or accessorized jewelry or even dry hair, but I would be clean.

So far I’ve made good on this promise, which I admit is distinctly less impressive than it even initially sounds since Aura has missed one million billion days of preschool, it being the Pit of Pestilence and all. Yes, I wear the same old pair of jeans and alternate between a couple of ratty hoodies, but I swear to you, I sparkle while doing it. Yet somehow this is becoming not quite enough.  I am beginning to feel a little cowed by some of the other mothers, most of whom are walking their adorable spawn in while also toting an infant. How is it that these mothers of two+ are pulling off perfect sweater-skinny-jeans-boot combinations at only 8:59 in the morning? What time are they getting up, anyway? I am stymied by these living, breathing examples of personal discipline.

And then there’s this one mother, who by all accounts seems to be a lovely person otherwise, who wears these sunglasses for which I would gladly trade some kind of limb.  No matter what she is wearing, the sunglasses make it look even better. She even showed up in pajama pants one day and still looked fresh from the runway. I am sorely tempted to ask her where she got them, but her kid’s not in Aura’s class and I would therefore need to invent a premise to justify approaching her, before I launch into an eyewear third-degree.

Honestly, that’s just too  much work for me. So instead, I shall make myself a second Drop-off with Dignity promise: Every Tuesday and Thursday, I will apply concealer. I’m not tying myself down to blush or lip gloss or anything else. But if I’m going to be too tired to go shopping for some proper clothes, at least no one will be able to tell.

Well, at least these two people in the immediate family have appropriate eyewear.