I’m sure there’s more of this type of thing coming: Fantasy vs. Reality. And sometimes it’s really tough to know how to respond. I want to banish Lucas’s fears and find myself telling him that certain things aren’t real: “Monsters aren’t real, so if you see a monster and it is bothering you, you can just tell him ‘Go away monster. You’re not real.'”

On the other hand, I don’t want to strip the otherworld away from him too soon, and leave him bereft of all the joy and creativity and peace and play it can offer. In Waldorf education, children are encouraged to believe in faeries, gnomes, nature spirits, etcetera, because it’s important to cultivate and validate the imagination. It’s thought that children come from this spirit world to the earth to live among humans and learn new things, and that it takes many years (7?) for the child’s spirit to incarnate fully. The early years are lived with one foot in heaven and one foot on earth. From what I’ve seen and experienced in Lucas’s life, I think I believe it.

Soooo, cute and happy creatures, noble and benevolent spirits are real. Mean, scary, and wicked things are not real. Hmm…

… Somehow, this feels like a lie. There is plenty of wickedness in the world. Monsters are real, and somehow we have to keep them away from our son, and teach him to recognize and discriminate between good and bad, helpful and harmful, loving and hating.

I guess I will do my best to tackle one monster at a time, and frequently invite the faeries to tea.

So, today, Lucas talked rather extensively about poop and dying. I understand that poop is a naturally fascinating subject for someone who has only recently mastered the toilet. Hearing him talk about dying and what happens when people die kind of threw me a little.

“What does ‘die’ mean?”
“Well… when a person’s body is too tired to live anymore, the body goes to sleep forever.”
“Do people who die zoom away?”
“Yes, I suppose they do. When the body goes to sleep, the spirit of the person lives on. Some people think the spirit goes up into the sky. I think the spirit of the person goes out of the body and goes into all the living things in the world.”

….later in the day….in a parking lot….

“Mom, is that girl dead?”
“What girl?”
“There,” pointing.
I looked around and didn’t see any girl.
“Where? I don’t see her.”
“Right there. I see her.”
“Oh….Um, I don’t know son.”

OK. I did not give that letter in my last entry to Keiko. I don’t know if I will. I wrote it when I was angry and wanted her to know it. But I don’t really know how much I want to punish her. I do and I don’t. Perhaps my higher self is tempering my anger now. I have not cried about it today. Yesterday I cried quite a lot.

Lucas knows nothing about the change. We are talking with other preschools and providers this week. Hopefully we will find a solution, and soon.

The weird and ironic part about all this is that Keiko thinks bad things are happening in her family because she said something “mean in a bad-energy tone” about our last teacher—to us. It happened when we were discussing the closure of our last school, and how little notice we received, how upsetting it was, and how we were looking for a reliable situation. What Keiko said was by my standards not mean, but honest. Yet she is blaming all of this on her one misstep.

Well, I can hardly believe this as I write it: Preschool number 2 has closed. That’s two in three weeks. That’s after Lucas has made new friends, after I came to believe that it would all work out.

Letter to Ex-Teacher #2:
Ex-Teacher #2,

We are very upset to hear your news. We chose your school in part because we felt you offered a stable, loving home-environment for our son, Lucas. I believe we have talked rather extensively about how he is still grieving over the closure of his last preschool, Little Gate Nursery School. He misses his old teacher every day.

And although we have assured Lucas repeatedly that his new preschool, Treasure Garden, is wonderful and that he will attend your school this whole year, we find ourselves in the sad position of having lied to him. I am disappointed to have provided him only a temporary “home” at Treasure Garden. I believe he is just beginning to settle into the new place and new routine.

I am upset that Lucas will not be able to enjoy a stable environment there and will have to face another transition and learn to trust a new teacher. He’s had enough upheaval for this short period of time, and we are eager to put an end to it.

I’m sure you understand that we will be withdrawing Lucas as soon as we have found a new school for him to attend, which we hope will be sometime before the end of October. I don’t like the idea of him getting more and more attached to you, Treasure Garden, and to the other children, only to have to say goodbye in the end anyway.

We will expect you to return any unused portions of our prepaid tuition and materials fee when we withdraw Lucas. We will need that money for our next school. We think this is fair, since we were mistakenly led to believe that your school would be a permanent, year-long situation.

I am sympathetic toward your mother’s condition, your father’s health, and the temporary splitting up of your family when you move to Japan. I’m sure that this is an awful position to be in, and this will be a difficult upheaval for your family as well.

However, we feel that the contract you had us sign was not written in good faith.

Sincerely,

Sara E. Wilson
Ian G. Wilson

Lucas is jumping on the bed in my office and dancing to Ian’s music–Ian’s playing a toy ukelele … badly. He’s singing about what’s for dinner and what happened at preschool today and making up lyics about the train museum and Lucas to the tune of “Stairway to Heaven.”

I love my life.

On a totally different train of thought …

I think I may be the only person I know who deliberately hides her head in the sand when the news comes on. Not just the TV news. I pretty much avoid most news every day. Ian fills me in on critical topics, I am embarrassed to say. (Honestly! I have a critical mind and a college degree and everything!) I have avoided reading a single word about Katrina and the human devastation she wrought. I can’t face the fact of families separated; children victimized in the absence of trusted loved ones; people crammed together, hungry and thirsty, grieving, ignored, neglected, forgotten. I eschew the news, the pictures, even the “feel-good” rescue stories that the media injects us with because they are like morphine; they are meant to make us forget all the pain that is being suffered right now.

But who am I to talk or blame others for ignoring or forgetting the wicked, unconscionable darkness of it all? I cling to my safety; to my warm, living, thriving son; to my husband who shields my eyes and ears from pictures and sounds that will break my heart and rattle around day and night inside my head. I cling to my mundane patterns and many joys and thank the universe for what I have.

I am moved to feel hatred and disdain for our government. I am moved to laughter that a Hollywood actor does more in one day to help the people of New Orleans than our President, the leader of our nation, the man we are supposed to be able to look to in our times of crisis. Where is our FDR? Our Kennedy? Remember what we heard from the Democrats in the last election? There are two Americas. It’s so clear.

It took nearly two weeks to break over me. I finally cried.

Lucas seems to be adjusting pretty well to Treasure Garden. I blew it yesterday and forgot Baby Tidoo at home. I was out during the day, but came home to a phone message from Miss Keiko saying, “Lucas would really like to have Baby Tidoo for naptime today, if you can bring her over.” (You have to imagine the Japanese accent.) I could hear Lucas shrieking in the background, crying for his dolly. Yes, I felt like a schmuck. I guess she held him until he finally fell asleep.
I apologized to them both, and promised never to forget Baby Tidoo again. I think I have proven my determination to Lucas by taping a little sign up on the front door. It says, “Don’t forget Baby Tidoo!!” He thinks that’s funny, and seems to have forgiven me.

Today, it sounds like Lucas napped at preschool without too much trouble (with Baby Tidoo snug in his arms). They made vegetable soup together at school. They played and got dirty. They were all seated around the table eating grapes and almonds when I came to pick Lucas up.

I should also mention that he talks about Ex-Teacher pretty often. Like all the way to TG today, he talked about Ex-Teacher and Ex-Preschool. He doesn’t believe me when I say that she’s not having school–that she closed the school. He’s sure she will come back and he will be able to go to her house and play with her. Adjusting to the new stuff isn’t turning out to be that hard. Letting go of the old stuff really is, though. I can tell Lucas is grieving and trying to sort out why a fixture of his life has vanished. Miss Keiko doesn’t sound worried, though. And she’s not taking any of what he says personally, either. That’s good because he’s said, “I like Miss Ex-Teacher. I’m going to go back to her preschool when she comes back.”

It’s somewhat warm today. More like our typical September weather than the last week has been. Lucas and I decided to go to my parents’ house for a swim. The air was lovely and warm; the water was frigid. Still, that doesn’t stop him from enjoying himself. And therefore, I bravely followed him into the pool. We splashed and played games until our lips turned blue. Lucas is quite the accomplished swimmer: provided he has his water wings on. (I meant to take him to swimming lessons this summer, but somehow time just got away from us. My work never really let up at all.)

Speaking of work, I’m swamped. I turned down four projects last week and one today! I hate turning down work. Even when I’m busy and the funds are flowing in, I always feel like starvation is just around the corner. I guess that’s freelancing for ya. Got a fat check from a client today (billed in advance), so I guess I really have to do the work.

This past weekend we were able to buy some clothes for each of us, and new tires for my car! That felt good. I’ve been driving around on a leaky rear tire for more than a year now. It’s been dangerously underinflated so often that the wear pattern on the tire was pretty grim. Ian’s new duds are swanky and for work. Lucas’s are practical and for the sandbox. And mine will probably never see the light of day, as they are grown-up, wear-them-outside-the-house-and-into-the-world kind of clothes. A girl’s gotta dream.

So, this really cool, totally generous person I know presented me with a box full of very expensive, gently used, beautiful, sexy undergarments tonight. They are mine to keep and I’m overwhelmed and delighted and grateful and giddy.

Thank you.

Today was Lucas’s third day at his new preschool, Treasure Garden. Although he has expressed not a little anxiety about this change, I think he’s adjusting well. Children are uniquely adaptable, right? (I hope so.) He still argues with me, though, that Ex-Teacher really IS having school this year, and that after this week, he can go back to her house. I just quietly say, “I’m sorry. Ex-Teacher is not having school this year.”

Treasure Garden is a source of new delights, new friends, new foods, and new activities. Miss Keiko is a darling Japanese woman who has run this preschool for 4 years now. Last year, she was completely full and had children on a waiting list. I don’t know how or why, but this year, she is thankfully not full, and we were able to enroll immediately, at the last GD minute. TG started one week later than Ex-Preschool, but all in all, it has worked out marvelously well.

Let’s see. Lucas misses Baby Kimberlee, his baby sister. But is rather enchanted by a little girl named Lauren, who is also 3 years old. Lauren is attending TG for the second year in a row, and goes there all of the days that Lucas goes. He seems very pleased about that and talks about her.

There’s also Sophia and her younger brother Joseph, and Charlie, who might be 4. Miss Keiko says that Lucas is very good a sharing and using his words with the other children.

I was struck with amazement on Tuesday morning as I drove to Sacramento Magazine that after just a one-hour interview and visit to TG, I happily handed over a check for $1,200+ and MY ONLY CHILD to a stranger and gushed, “Have a wonderful day! (Mommy always comes back.)”

Those first two days, VoVo had to pick him up from school. I’m a little sad that I didn’t get to hear first hand what he had to say about the place those days, but VoVo has assured me that it was all positive. The only thing that indicates he’s still a bit nervous is that he wouldn’t nap there at all.

It’s Wednesday night now, and Lucas won’t be back to school until next Monday, but he seems to be looking forward to it.

What treasures did Lucas bring home from Treasure Garden? A painting, a song, and hand-packed organic peppermint teabags. The bread they made from scratch didn’t make it home.

Today was a Mommy-Lucas Day. These are precious Fridays during which I try hard to ignore my clients and make up for lost time with Lucas—the time when Lucas has been with other caregivers. Sometimes Mommy-Lucas days are magical and fun and serve to recharge my batteries, reset my Guiltometer nearer to zero, and remind me how amazing and delightful my little boy is.

Today was one of those days. Despite the huge pile of work on my desk, the looming deadlines, and the two offers of MORE editing projects, I took my kid out for a morning of fun-but-ordinary errands.

First we went to see Dr. O’Brian, Mommy’s chiropractor. My back is doing better now, thank you. I may have just one appointment next week instead of two! Lucas likes Dr. O’Brian because he has toys and tuning forks and a giant orange gym ball that makes an awesome “boing” when Lucas dribbles it in the exam room. I like Dr. O’Brian because he folds and twists and hugs my spine into a popping-cracking bliss. For a doctor, he gives really good hugs.

Next, Lucas and I headed toward the fish/aquarium store. My poor fish are suffocating in a dingy tank with a very, very old and scudgy filter. Lucas and I both like to peer into fish tanks, noses on the glass. We like all the colors fish come in, especially the blue ones. On the way, though, Lucas announced that he had to go potty, so we had to make a detour back to our house.

OK. Then we went to the fish store. Alas, they were closed. We headed for a nearby pet store instead. Their back room has some nice fish. We saw orange fish and turtles and lizards with blue tongues. We watched the bunnies and saw tiny mice running on a wheel. Lucas thought they were pretty funny. The love birds were too loud, we decided. We bought blue and green rocks to go in the tank, after I clean it.

Lunchtime. We walked across the parking lot to the “Round Tables.” Lucas has been asking to go there for a while. The kid polished of three pieces of pizza! Then we drove down the road a little way to stop in at Baskin Robins. (Yeah, I know it’s junk food.) He ate a sherbet called “Wild & Reckless.” It was bright blue, green, and purple. It takes a really long time for a 3-year-old to eat a single scoop on a sugar cone.

We stopped in at Ross next. I bought him two toys there for $10. One is an indoor bowling set with a soft ball and six soft pins. The other is a lacing kit that has wooden cards with holes to lace or “sew.” They show pictures of vehicles, including a train. Some crankiness set in at Ross. Lucas wanted a toy that I didn’t want to buy and he was getting tired. He conveniently waited until I was naked in the dressing room before he announced that he had to go potty. But I took it in stride. I bought myself a light jacket.

Other good things happened today too: Lucas napped! I worked for an hour. We bowled … inside. We visited Grandma Sydney, and when Ian and Papa got done with work, we all went out for Chinese food. And at bedtime, Lucas didn’t fuss or argue.

And now, after 14 1/2 good hours with my son, I can finally turn my attention to my husband. Goodnight.