Arriving

What happens when a thought/question invades your mind and then gradually unveils a mystery of your self; deep or otherwise.

I was hounded and rather bewitched for the longest, last year, by the one question in my mind, 'Why do I send her to school?'

It came to me because the child herself took the question out of my mouth.

Our life, since the start of Grade I, the beginning of primary schooling, had led to a disarray in the very meaning of schooling. I, for one, was faced with this question- stark and solid before me. Being a pro-unschooler, I was beaten to brutal guilt and remorse over having made the decision of sending her to school. 

I was advised to not take matters too hard upon myself or complicate things than they really needed to be but to allow the kid to just figure it for herself.

But what if the kid demands such a response, an acknowledgement from you? What if she is looking for genuine help as she is lost in all the concreteness and rigidity of a school? What if, all she wanted was to see me try? But try how, I'd wondered endlessly on all those nights for a whole six months.

And she for once, although a lover of community, togetherness and sociality, didn't at all buy the idea of following a protocol that came with an institution.

I began to see that we place school on a very high pedestal when it came to the child's childhood. But why, I wondered ? 

Everything centred around the school and then I came to realise that her school wasn't enforcing that kind of obligation upon us as long as we're both honestly trying to nurture a beautiful relationship with each other.

That was all that I needed from a school. 

Striving in its own growth with the children and at the same time allowing us- parent and child- their essential independent fortification. No umbilical cord here. 

School is merely an element of growth and learning in our existence, I believed and still do with all my heart.

Although, I was pretty clear on all this about the school I've been sending her to and her and myself, I was gripped with self-loathe and a feeling of inadequacy for not being a capable mom to a kid who is competent enough to stand on her own feet, vivacious and passionate on matters she truly feels for.

So when the question, 'why send me to school?' invaded our intimacy and persisted on staying; I began the natural process of searching. For what ? An answer? A reason to console myself and perhaps extend it to the child.

I decided to plant a seed of empathy into her, for her teachers while saying things like,' Your teacher is not always shouty, you know? She can also crack a joke, laugh, cry and do other things. She is a human with feelings just like you.'

The kid absorbed it all with admirable wisdom for her age but how does she apply empathy when I'm feeding it to her externally? It doesn't work that way. She must see it for herself, begin to grow it in her heart of her own accord and then release it. 

Empathy is self-taught. So I stopped trying.

But then, a crucial turning point arrived- December.

Funny, how some months of a year define your life however trivial they may seem later to you.

Drama rehearsals were on full swing for the upcoming Annual Day celebrations later that month. I saw liberation. I met liberation and a form of solidarity face to face that month.

'The rehearsals must have done it,', I thought to myself.
Things must have loosened a bit during the time and she began to see her teachers in a new light. They had several shades to them than she thought they did. At least, that is how I think she thought.
But it was only a thought I saw. She said nothing of the sort to validate it. She only showed.

I decided to finally acknowledge the incessant grousing and poetic laments she had made over the past months and made an appointment to spill my heart with her Principal.

Once I'd confronted her, it felt like such a surge of release. She was forthcoming and compassionate about the matter and promised to have a word with her teachers for whom she has such utmost faith in. And I, for once, decided to plant faith in her convictions.

I went home feeling jubilant and victorious that day, relaying everything to her once she'd gotten back home as well. But things didn't seem to change so much with the kid. There was no glimmer of hope or gratitude in the kid's eyes. The ingrate !

 

She is a tough nut to crack so I gave her time. I gave her school time as well.

Things began to come clean post the drama rehearsals. I began to recognise, with a blinding awareness, that I was hoping to see her be herself in her present new environment (given time 
) like she was in her kindergarten days. Her alteration during the initial months to survive school broke my heart. 'Why cloak yourself when in class?' I would ask her without really asking her.

But one cannot fool oneself for long and so the facade began to disintegrate. The restlessness of 'wanting to just be' grew to intolerance and impatience all the way till the drama rehearsals in December. 

I allowed her the intolerance she very much needed to see the unfairness she was inflicted on, as a child, a student in class. To not give in to a certain authoritarian experience she (and class as a community) was enduring.

I know it was that intolerance that brought me all the way to her Principal's office.

I became her voice. So that one day she becomes her own voice.

But then, there was a marvellous shift. Change was happening at a glacial progression but it was happening nevertheless and only last week, she declared, 'I think I'm okay with school now'.
She comes home with snippets that give me a peek into school, her feeling more in her skin now than I'd ever thought possible will be achieved soon. At least, I know for a fact that she is getting there. It is only a matter of time.

May be she is finally being herself. Just being. And that makes her happy.
And that to me is a major triumph of the year, a triumph she's made over herself by simply reclaiming space for her in school and allowing herself to include others around her- as possibly as she can.
She's redeemed herself. And that is enough.


As for me, I'd been through a rather hyperbolic learning period during the later half of last year up till now, when it came to these matters and where I stood on these things.

It dawned on me, earlier this year, that the true reason in the decision to school her is for her to be able to comfortably exist in the very fibre of her being ANYWHERE, weathering any form of environment- congenial or otherwise, spilling her molecules as she grows gloriously onward and upward.