Back To School
What an understatement to say that 2020 has been tough on families. There are so many problems intensified by the Coronavirus: the isolation, the worry about disease and money, stores out of stock of everything, even croutons, why croutons? There was adapting to the work from home situation or worse the not working. The teachers, parents and children struggled to figure out virtual learning.
Summer which should have been about camp, the beach and trips to the ice cream shop forfeited the free and easy for the anxiety of ‘will the kids return to school?’ If the kids return to school, how will it work? Do you send the kids to school or not send them? It seemed that every day brought new information, a new plan, or a new worry . It was draining just to listen to all the possible iterations.
So, in my third year of retirement as a teacher, I find myself supervising the little blue school house ( I just had the house painted) for three of my grandchildren, fourth grade, second grade and kindergarten and for good measure a two-year-old who wants her own tablet. Yes, she knows how to use it. Day one there were a couple of logistical bumps but we managed. Granted as a retired teacher I had a solid head start. My heartfelt condolences to every adult who doesn’t share my advantage.
This school year is going to be like no other. Everyone is re-arranging their lives, once again in 2020 fashion to take care of the children. It seems to be a recurring theme, the concern for the children -for their health and sometimes the lack of health insurance. Schools are also aware of child abuse, and homelessness. Schools have always known about food insecurity and try to remedy it with breakfast and lunch program. If the national interest in the welfare of children was true, the disgrace of separating children from parents at the border would have never happened. In that regard Kellyanne Conway was right. “More mama, less drama” is in the best interest of the children. As of end of August, Ms. Conway resigned as Counsellor to President Trump.
Kellyanne’ children are older than my grandchildren. I’m relieved that my grandchildren are not teenagers in the age of Covid. With 25 years of insanity, I mean teaching high school, under my belt. I know teenagers are a rare breed. As the saying goes, a teenager is the one who cries like baby when they are not treated like adults. Unfortunately for Kellyanne, she has gotten a very potent dose of the teenage lack of common sense and hyper awareness of their own feelings.
Teenagers have a knack of bending reality for their own convenience. Consider this example, teenager is grounded for some legit offense and loses their cellphone privileges. When the house catches fire the teenager would be found sitting on the curb watching the blaze. When the parent asks why didn’t you call 911, the teen would reply indignantly. “You told me not to use my phone.” Certainly this scenario is extreme but it makes the point. For generations, parents thought this type of hair-splitting logic was the teenage brain trying to find alignment with the civilized world. Three and a half years ago, this syndrome was renamed “alternative facts.”
Since Amy, the daughter of President Jimmy Carter, it’s been hands off the kids in living in the White House, as it should be. I repeat, as it should be. That was the 1970’s, there was no cable news, our homes didn’t have computers and no one carried a cell phone in their pocket.
That’s old school stuff. Twitter and Tik Tok are the today’s teenage tools of rebellion. Claudia Conway, Kellyanne’s daughter the bright kid of well-known parents vented on social media platforms. In the age of a plethora of news outlets people followed and responded. Suddenly, a brand-new strain of virus was born.
The Conways are a Washington power couple. George Conway is high powered conversative attorney and a vocal critic of President Trump. Not since James Carville and Mary Maitlin has the country been treated to a political power couple joined in marriage but not in politics. Carville and Maitlin have both stated that politics were never discussed at home. Although Matalin is not a born Southerner, I’m sure she had command of the phrase, “Bless your heart.” Carville would know by the inflection of those three words whether it meant, ‘you are the dearest thing’ or the polar opposite. Being a fine southerner gentleman Carville would have the sense to back off.
In the past, POTUS always observed the separation of the country’s politics and the family dinner table. A teenager wants to be the only agitator on the block. They crave that room clearing kind of control that comes with uttering the outrageous statements. They don’t want to go to school and know that their schoolmates heard mom’s boss tweet:
“I don’t know what Kellyanne did to her deranged loser of a husband, Moonface, but it must have been really bad.” It will never sit well with a teenager to have her mom defend POTUS against her dad.
OMG! TMI!
Perhaps, Claudia is right. It’s all about the ambition, the fame and the money. It’s also about the pace of today’s world and doing your job and protecting your paycheck which protects your family. Millions of other families don’t have the choice to voluntarily step back because there are other jobs. It doesn’t change the worry for the children involved. It does almost always come back to the children, be it the ones’ suffering food insecurity, the lack of health insurance, connectivity for the computer to continue their schooling, and the ones’ being separated from their parents at the borders or what seems to be a huge chasm at the dinner table.
I am managing three or four zoom classes a day for each of my three grandchildren. I’m photographing assignments and uploading them to their teachers. Of course, I also oversee breakfast, second breakfast, morning snack, lunch and afternoon snack. It’s a full day! I remember that families will be families long after this presidency comes to an end. The societal problems that plague families will be there too. But for now, peace at the dinner table is a priority.