Luck of the Draw

My daughter Shelby and I have this tradition where we ride our bikes up to her elementary school and check out the posted lists of her classmates for the upcoming school year. She was thrilled to get her postcard from her new teacher in the mail today, too.

So, I get home from work a bit early and we ride up to the school (getting to ignore most of the traffic laws that will be in place Thursday morning once the string of crossing guards make you walk you bike through the crosswalks).

Lots of kids, some with notebooks, writing down who is in their class. Lots of parents, too. One mom made me crazy when she talked to her child's new teacher and was mentioning that her daughter has been a "reading machine" this summer and "got the accelerated reader list off the internet" and has started reading ahead.

My daughter looked over the list and came away 0 for 4 of good friends in her class. No Lauren. No Kiana. No Alexis. No Samantha. To hear her tell it, she doesn't no anyone in the class. Something tells me drama was the order of the afternoon.

I did what any dad would do: I ordered her favorite food for dinner, and we watched her favorite show (The Cosby Show reruns) together. I might not can fix the problem (nor would I want to, frankly) but I can eat and hang out with the best of 'em.