A day spent riding the emotional rollercoaster

Last Tuesday morning I was the first one in our house to wake up, which is super rare considering Chris generally has to inject two cups of French Roast into my system before I start forming words and he’s comfortable leaving me to care for his kids. But that morning I was anxious to get the day started, as I had two big tasks on hand:  Tour an elementary school and Take Taylor to get a haircut. Yeah. And by the amount of nervous energy I had, you would think Perform brain surgery with a toothpick would be on that list.

And the haircut really wasn’t stressing me out, it was the school tour. You see, for the past year I keep getting asked where I’m going to send Taylor to kindergarten this upcoming fall, and in the next month we need to make the final decision. And because we live within the Asheville city limits, we can choose whichever of the five magnet schools we like the best. Which to some of you may sound like a perfectly normal thing, but I was raised in rural Iowa, where you didn’t have a choice in the matter. That’s where you live, so that’s where you go to school.

So the fact that we’ve got to choose where she goes to school is nerve-racking. What if I choose wrong? What if in three years she looks at me and says, MOM! My life would be perfect if I would have gone to that other school. You ruined everything! So I’m trying to be calculating and informed in this process. Because I’m pretty sure Taylor isn’t going to need any extra ammo in proving I indeed have absolutely no idea what I am doing.

But you know what’s even more stressful than choosing the wrong school? The fact that my first-born is going to be in KINDERGARTEN. Oh my God. I just had to take a deep breath and shake out my hands. This is all happening way too fast.

And luckily I was already familiar with three of the closest schools to us, both from driving past regularly and from having friends with kids in each of these schools. And while I know that the physical look of a school shouldn’t be a deciding factor, the actual location is very important to me. Not only for closeness, but for safety. Some areas just aren’t as warm and fuzzy to me as others. And I’m going to be sending my baby there. Five days a week. From 7.45 in the morning until 2.30 in the afternoon. And now I’m shaking the crazy out of my hands again.

So, being the proactive parent I aspire to be, I arranged a private tour of a precious looking, highly recommended school close to us. And after dropping off Luke at a friend’s house, Chris and I toured the facility with the school’s principal. And it was awesome. There is an entire wing just for kindergarten and first grades, as well as two playgrounds, an amazing auditorium, a well-stocked art room and a fabulous music room. And just walking into each of the kindergarten classrooms and meeting each of the teachers just put my heart and mind at ease as to Taylor’s well-being. She will love everything about that school, and I all but bear-hugged the principal after the two-hour tour, saying over and over again how impressed I was.

And I practically skipped to my car when the tour was over, in that I was so relieved that we were done debating which school to choose. Chris had to leave early, and when I picked up the phone to call him and confirm how awesome it was, I noticed I had a missed call and a voicemail from my Dad.

And before I even listened to the message, my stomach had dropped. It’s not like my Dad to call that early on a weekday unless it was something important. And it was. My Grandma had passed away that morning. I sat in my car in the school parking lot, took a few deep breaths and called him back.

When I got through, I was talking to both my Dad and Mom on the bluetooth in  their car as they were driving up to Storm Lake. Grandma had been living with advanced Alzheimer's in a nursing home for the last five years. Her body, while frail, had endured longer than her mind, as she struggled to even recognize her own family towards the end. She passed away suddenly yet peacefully, and while we knew she was now up in heaven, it was still very sad that we would never be able to hug her again.

I told my Dad how sorry I was and reminded both of my parents how much I loved them, ended the call and then immediately phoned Chris at work to let him know what was going on. And right there, still sitting in my car at the school parking lot, I instantly switched gears from gathering details about my daughter’s future school into figuring out how I was going to get back to Iowa for a funeral.

Talking to Chris, we realized we had a lot to figure out with scheduling and kid-care before booking a plane ticket for me to get back to the farm. If it wasn’t for such a short amount of time and under different circumstances, I would have considered the idea of traveling solo with both kids across the country. But trying to fly back with two little people and then entertaining them during a visitation and funeral would have required at least three different crazy-pill prescriptions for me to survive.

Oh, and this was really the first funeral we’ve had since Taylor was born, so we hadn’t even had the death-talk with her yet. And I want to delay that for as long as possible, so it was decided early on that I was going to be making the trip home without kids.

So the rest of the morning was spent messaging and talking with Dad, Mom, Libba and Will, looking at potential flights and trying to keep Luke from doing the electric slide on the kitchen table every time I left the room. Oy! That one with the big head is exhausting.

And after picking Taylor up from school we immediately headed downtown for her hair appointment. I had scheduled it the week before, after the final of many meltdowns over combing out the tangles in her beautiful, beautiful hair. It had been nearly five months since her last trim, and when I mentioned we were getting her haircut she anxiously started squealing in excitement and making chopping finger-motions at her lovely long locks.

And her enthusiasm for the haircut kept bubbling out of her as we drove downtown, parked and made our way into the salon. And when we sat down in our stylist’s chair and were asked what we wanted to do today, Taylor grabbed about five inches up from the bottom of her hair and said, I want it THIS short! And in all of my distraction, I just nodded my head and waved my arms in the air and said, Whatever. Let’s make it healthy and easy to come through.

It wasn’t until I saw all her gorgeous curls collecting on the floor that I realized how short we were going. And my face must have said it all, as sweet little Brandlynn started sputtering, It’s OKAY! It’ll grow back!

And afterwards, as promised, I took both kids to YoLo for some frozen goodness, and I was too distraught to buy myself a serving. And when I messaged Paige to tell her I was so upset about Taylor’s short hair that I didn’t have an appetite for frozen yogurt covered in candy bar bits, she instantly called me to see if I was okay. Because that never happens.

So that night when I saw Chris drive up, I ran down to intercept him in the garage and started panicking about how I let our daughter ruin her hair. And then my wonderful husband grabbed me and said, I don’t think this about Taylor’s haircut. I think you’re having a very emotional day, and everything is going to be okay. And I pretty much lost it, finally crying for the first time since getting Dad’s message this morning.

Grieving is a tricky thing, and I managed to channel all my heartbreak over my Grandma’s passing into a couple inches of cut hair. And the haircut is great, actually. Taylor absolutely loves her new do, and I very much enjoy being able to comb through it without her screaming at me. So at least I know that years down the road, even if I end up picking the wrong school for her to go to, she cannot give me a hard time about not letting her get the haircut she wanted.