Fayette-Mom: Waiting for the teacher assignment

Mass emails. Text messages. Frantic phone calls. Constantly checking the mail box.

Waiting for The Letter.

It’s teacher assignment time.

I promised myself I wouldn’t do this again. Last summer, as I waited to find out who would be Emma’s kindergarten teacher and what, if any, of her friends would share her class, I caused myself an unbelievable amount of anxiety. I thought my daughter’s very happiness hinged on the name that would appear on that letter, and her outlook of school would forever remain dismal if she got a less than stellar assignment.

I needn’t have worried. Emma had a wonderful kindergarten year, and she made great new friends. See there, I told myself. It all works out, one way or another. Relax.

I made it about halfway through the summer before I started to fret all over again. We moms knew we would get The Letter the first week of August. We set up a network of phone calls, text messages and emails, detailing who gets their mail first in the morning and who has to wait until late in the day. Lists were compiled and notes were compared. There was joy. There were a few tears. There’s been more than a little bit of frustration.

Mostly, I’m disappointed in myself. I thought I’d learned a valuable lesson. There’s no use in worrying over something of which I have no control. All it does is cause undue anxiety, and I certainly didn’t want to pass that on to Emma as she’s poised to start the first grade.

Emma’s teacher will be fine. She will make friends in her class. And her school year will be a terrific one.

If I say it enough times, maybe I’ll even start to believe it.