Confession

The day after Labor Day, Brandon started school.  I packed his lunch for him, got up early to fix him a good breakfast, and kissed him goodbye as he walked to his first day.

The day after Labor Day, children in Arlington started school.  Kathleen ate lunch at home, took a nap, and helped me begin to unpack our UAB.  The next day she had lunch at home again.  And the next day.  She's had lunch at home every day since school started, and will continue to do so into the foreseeable future.

Because she's not going to school.  Instead she's staying home for school.

I like to consider myself a fairly mainstream person - conservative mainstream, but still mainstream.  All of my children have been born at hospitals, and with epidurals.  I stay at home with my children, and they take naps and go to bed early.  My children have all been vaccinated, and I don't buy organic produce because it's too expensive.  My husband is a bureaucrat.  I've never even dyed my hair, and don't own a single pair of skinny jeans.

So I am somewhat unnerved by knowing that while almost all of the other children Kathleen's age are learning the classroom rules and where the bathroom is, she's at home with me.  I think that Kathleen is much less uneasy than I am with the arrangement.

Brandon and I made this decision some time ago, and have reasons we consider sound, as do most people for most decisions they make.  But now that my child is officially not attending public school, I almost feel like I am getting away with something against the rules.  

I know that when I home school Kathleen, she will miss out on experiences she would have in traditional school.  But I also know that if she were in traditional school, she would have experiences she wouldn't have at home.  No choice is without consequences.

But at least when she visits with her therapist in about twenty years, she'll have something solid to start with when she's blaming her parents for her problems.