Classes Start Wednesday

Sometimes it's not easy to pause in the midst of the busyness of the beginning of the semester (meetings, planning schedules, cleaning up those things I should have put away at the end of spring semester, meetings) to soak in the energy that having the students back in town brings.

I'll try to share over the next couple of weeks a few of those beginning of the year moments that help get me back in the school has started groove.

#1 - Playing the how many students we'll see at Target (or any other store) game
My wife Heather (also, an ONU professor) and I played on Saturday. The rules are simple count the number of students you know. Most names wins. I guessed I'd see three going in. I counted five and had a chance to at least say hi to four of the five. I think I may concede victory to Heather because, while I saw more students, she was asked for nutrition-related advice by a couple of her former students. By the way, we also saw three other professors at the local ice cream shop. Maybe we're all trying to hold on to summer a bit longer.

First Days

Well, it has happened. I'm officially the parent of a school age daughter. Emilia dressed in her new sandals, the dress her mom picked out for her in Portugal, and the necklace they had negotiated wearing marched through the front door of the school at 8:45 on Tuesday morning. I have to admit to having shed more than a few tears as I drove around the neighborhood waiting for her mom come back out from the school.

My tears are the same ones that parents have been crying for all sorts of happy, proud, and, yes, kind of sad moments. While I don't remember my parents' tears on my first day of kindergarten, I do remember them on other days...orientation at ONU, dropping me off at school each year, my wedding, after helping us pack up and move to Kansas, before we left for Portugal. I think I understand their tears a little bit better now that I've started to cry them, too.

I also couldn't help but think about the many other firsts that I'll get to experience with my girls and the tears I'll probably cry once their out of sight. I'm sure they'll catch me crying at some point. I just hope they understand that the tears, while they may be shed out of sadness that my little girls are growing up, are really ones that flow out of the excitement I see as I look out at their futures.