The Sunday before the first day of school has always been my favorite Sunday of the year. It's always full of excitement mixed with anticipation mixed with sadness of seeing yet another summer come to an end. We always have a family night that ends with my dad giving all of us back-to-school fathers blessings and no matter how hard we try to remain calm and collected, the tears always come and an entire box of tissues is consumed. This, the most important part and my favorite part of the night, has remained the same throughout the years. The following is but a distant memory of what took place during my elementary days:
After the tears were wiped and the noses were blown, we would all rush up to our bedrooms and rummage through the sacks of new school clothes to pick out our favorite outfit, the one that would go down in the scrapbooks as our "first-day-of-school outfit." Then it was time for the fashion show. The clothes we had chosen were put on and one by one we would walk down the stairs to see if mom approved. It was at this point in the night that she was cutting our favorite and annual back-to-school treat, peanut butter bars, and before we could eat, our new clothes had to be carefully laid out, ready for the next morning. After our treats were scarfed down, the sponge curlers were rolled into my hair and then it was time to brush our teeth, say our prayers and go to bed. Of course, I laid in bed for what seemed like hours before I could really fall asleep but before I knew it, mom was waking me up for a new school year. Pictures were snapped of us in our new outfits, we met up with all the other neighborhood kids and as tradition has it, all of our mothers walked with us to school to see us off. We lined up on the blacktop with our new class until our teacher beckoned for us to enter the classroom that would be ours for the next nine months. The actual school day was full of disclosures, new crayons and pencils from the teacher and more name games than I knew even existed. That night, after the much anticipated "Back to School Neighborhood BBQ", it was time for bed once again.
And then it was over. The first day of school had come to an end. I miss those days of the traditional 'first day of school.' I was tremendously disappointed last year, when the night before my first day of college went nothing like that and I didn't play a single name game in one of my classes. I guess I'll just have to live vicariously through my brothers in order to have a proper 'first day of school' this year and count today as my day.
Aw, Stace, I love what you write. It's always so heartfelt and relatable. I definitely have similar memories of first days of school, and I thank you for writing this to remind me of them. You have a gift.
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