Shortly after moving to San Francisco, the kids had their 2nd and 6th summer birthdays. We celebrated both birthdays with cake and ice cream and a few gifts. We just had a family party, just the four of us. The only gift I can remember is Danny's Snoopy lunchbox because he would be starting school in a few weeks.
Yes, in just a few weeks I was to put this small 6 year old boy on a bus to go off of the base to a public San Francisco school and trust that somehow he was going to return to me. I wanted to keep him home all safe and warm under my care. This is the first time in my parenting days that I was traumatized. There were to be several more through the years, but this was devastating to me. When the dreaded day came I walked him down to the bus stop a few blocks away. Now this was a walk that he was quite capable of doing himself, but not today!!! lol I did put him on that school bus that day, and I asked the bus driver how in the world was he going to get him home. He assured me that they have been doing this for many years and they never lost a child yet. Of course I worried and stewed about it most of the day and I was at that bus stop to meet him when and if he ever got home. It was nothing short of a miracle to me that he did return home.
One day Danny came home from school with a large bulge in his pocket. I asked him what it was and he pulled his ripped tee shirt out of the pocket. When I asked him what happened he said that a peach boy ripped it off of him at recess. I inquired what a peach boy was and he replied that he wasn't black and he wasn't white, he was a peach.
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Good lord....what in the heck is a peach boy? Obviously I have blocked this from my mind. With good reason.
ReplyDeleteby calling him a peach, you meant he wasn't white but wasn't black either---he was somewhere in the middle (a peachy color).He was probably mexican, indian or oriental.
ReplyDeletei can totally sympathize with you on your feelings on putting him on that bus. I've felt the same way a number of times and my kids aren't going near as far.
ReplyDeleteLike I said it traumatized me, he was so very small and innocent to the ways of the world. He had never even been away from me except the couple hours he was in kindergarten, and I was the transportation for that.
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