The Kindergarden Krazies

Five years ago I was a little over halfway pregnant with my first child. I found out on January 20th 2008 that we were having a baby boy and then in May, Josiah entered our lives a month earlier than planned. He was perfect. Since that moment life has gone by way too fast. Jaime and I went from two to five all before my baby could turn five. I love having a big family and I know that he wouldn't trade his brother and sister for anything but... I've somehow missed the last five precious years. The only ones where I will get him in his entirety before handing him over someone else. Someone who as a county resident, I actually have no control over. I can fill out the paper work and make "requests" which will try to honored after all the city residents are placed at their top choices. Our neighborhood school is terrible. On their school report card  they received a 2 out of 10. So no, they will not be getting my little boy who can read a few small words, write anything I tell him to spell and can add any combination of numbers from 1-10. He is smart y'all. Yes, because I'm just crazy enough to sit around and do flash cards with him for the last 4 years but mostly because he belongs to his Daddy who forgot his calculator the day of the SAT and scored so high that he still has a plaque on the wall at our old high school.

His school needs to be perfect. And my vision of a perfect school isn't a bunch of white kids dressed in outfits from the Gap in a row quietly listening and sitting in a desk. I feel like he needs to be in a school where you see all different types of people and go outside a lot and throw your left over (organic!) lunch in a compost bin and talk about saving the planet. Where you can learn by seeing and doing... all the while becoming respectful, consious little people of a great big world.

We have a charter school, Evergreen, that is everything I've ever wanted but we can't go there. There is another charter school Art Space, love it, can't go there either. Then we have a city school whose focus is experiential learning. They have actual chickens and the kindergardeners go outside and collect and count the eggs! YES! Can't go there. So, where can we go? Honestly, the other choices are good too. And compared to our neighborhood school they may as well be Harvard. But which one will we get? This is my perfect, first born. I kinda expect Harvard.

I don't think I realized how much the whole thing was weighing on me until I toured every school in town over the course of one morning. I was a wreck and had pretty much decided to give up when I remembered: I go to church now. PRAY! I'm pretty sure even in all my spiritual newness that you aren't allowed to pray for specifics (i.e. let him get into Evergreen and I will never create another piece of waste as long as I live) but I can totally pray that he ends up exactly where he is supposed to. Because the reality of it is, he's gonna be fine. Wherever that may be. I may not be, but he will. Even if he went across the street to Johnson. Who knows, maybe he could teach the class? It'd be like Doogie Houser MD but with teachers instead of doctors. We would be famous and then I could afford to send him to some crazy hippie private school like the Learning Community or Rainbow Mountain. But, I digress. All I can do now is enjoy these last moments of Pre-K where I still rule the world. Oh how I love this sweet boy.

Hot Chocolate 10K Race Report

This past weekend I ran the Hot Chocolate 10K. 6.2 miles through Asheville's River Arts District in support of Issac Dickson Elementary School. I've known so many people to do this race over the years but I have shied away from it myself due the fact that it is in January. And January is cold. Even though I am going on my 9th year here in Western North Carolina, I still say Wilmington when people ask me where I'm from. I can out sit anyone in a sauna and think my natural habit may be somewhere around ninety degrees. Kinda like those iguanas that lay on hot tin roofs all over Costa Rica. Did you know that heat thriving species have an actual name? Thermophile. A little bit of trivia for your Monday morning. Anyway, I don't usually run outdoors in January but this winter has been the exception because of all the marathon training. Rain, snow, ice, dark, cold... I haven't had much of a choice. Thankfully, its been a mild winter and I have been dressed in the finest cold weather gear lululemon has to offer. The bundle me run jacket could make even a thermophile go out for a quick spin in a blizzard.

So. My running partner was headed to Disney World and I was dying for a break from our Saturdays spent together running ALL DAY LONG so I was happy to see her go. Have a great trip! I'll be sure to keep up with my training! Can't wait til ya get back! And then I took my running shoes and put them in my closet and fell asleep. Sheesh, 3 kids under 5 and running every moment I'm not with them has taken its toll the last 10 weeks. Still, I needed to do something over the weekend so why not run 6.2 flat little miles around town. I mean with all the running I'd been doing that would probably only take like 45 minutes and then I could go home and go back to sleep. Seriously, in my exhausted over run brain I thought I was going to run SO fast. I called my friend Bill and made him sign up and even challenged him to a race. We bet babysitting and this tired Mama really needed a night out. Bill loves to say stuff to me like, "I like running with you until you get tired and don't wanna talk...then I'll take off." which historically is kind of what happens. But not on January 26th. No sir. I was "only' running six miles and I was going to get a free babysitter. Here I am pre-run with my sweet family who came out to support me during the race.   

Do we look cold? That's because we were. It was freezing. 25 degrees with a wind chill of I dunno like, 250? The wind was whipping around doing something us beach people like to call a hurricane. Still, I am a marathon runner. I must run. So the horn went off and Bill says (of course!) "I'm just gonna run with you until you stop talking to me" Ha! I was already done talking to him. I ran off and went as fast as I could through the grass and the sidelines to sidestep all the people who weren't trying to win a babysitter. Thinking I'd shake him I turned up my music (Girl on Fire) really loud and kept going. We ran past mile one and a guy calls out Seven minutes, thirty seconds. "You're insane!" I hear through my music. Damn it. Bill was still next to me. The first half I really was on fire. With my feet on the ground. Not slowing down. I passed the 5K mark in twenty-three something and headed back the opposite way on river-side drive when WHAM! The wind blew me back. Ok, so maybe I wasn't really on fire and the wind was just blowing me along for three miles and now it was blowing me backwards. But more importantly, Bill was nowhere in sight. So I pushed against the wind in slow motion which thankfully, I have gotten really good at. Running forever in slow motion has been my mantra these last two and a half months. I dragged myself up that mean way too long of a hill (named Hill Street) and crossed the finish line in 53:15 which is a 10K PR for me, so yay! Just don't look at my splits which would show just how slow I was on the second half.

Oh and I beat Bill. Who finished in a respectable 54 minutes ( but still 45 seconds after me!). He was a good sport even though he rambled off something about having been in Michigan the night before and missing an airplane and renting car and maybe driving to the race from Charlotte? I don't know. I couldn't really hear him over Josiah and Oliver chanting Mommy Won!  

 

Only now how sad is it that I'm using my free babysitting time to go for a long run with my husband? Get a life much? Sheesh!