Sermons and Confessions

I recently attended my first parent teacher interview.  In three years of school I’ve never seen the need.  We have a bright and happy boy who has always and continues to do well at school.  My wife was tied up at work and couldn’t be there, so I found myself waiting outside the classroom alone as the couple before me went well over their allotted time.

I wasn’t sure that I really needed to be here this time.  The reason I was there was concern over the fluctuation we have between a motivated, enthusiastic boy who gets himself ready for school and makes his own lunch and the distressed, crying boy who won’t let go of his mother to let her out of the door when he is dropped off.

It makes you realise, as I have ever since his first night on earth when I held his hand in the crib at the hospital, that there is no owners manual with children.

His teacher has no answers either.  He sees a happy boy who is a good student and who is popular with the other kids.  Maybe it’s just the end of term blues, maybe he’s got a bit of a cold, maybe it’s something more serious.  Thoughts like bi-polar, aspergus and worse can’t be stopped from appearing in your head.

Thankfully the teacher and I have formed a little partnership and have agreed to monitor the problem and communicate.  I’m quietly confident we’ll get it right.  We have to, of course, because so much is at stake.

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