May2015

May, May, go away. Oh wait,
that’s rain. Nevertheless, if
you have school-age children,
you might secretly want May to
disappear. You are not alone.
On the surface, and before you
know any better, May seems to
be such a happy month. It even
sounds happy. Say it now.
Feels like prancing barefoot in
a soft field of daisies, doesn’t
it? Not like February, which
not only sounds sharpedged
and icy cold, many
people can’t pronounce it or spell it
correctly. Nobody ever misspells May.
Alas, the more children
you have, and the older
they get, the more
you dread even the
mere mention of
that deceptively
named evil
month.
It starts innocently
enough, mind you. You’ve
got a kindergarten kid, and the
room mother asks you to call the
other moms to contribute to an end-ofthe-year
gift card for the teacher and
her classroom aide. Ten dollars per
child sounds easy enough, so you say
sure, why not?
Leave pleasant request messages
for twenty to thirty
parents. Four call
back and tell you
they’re in. You make
second calls. Get three more
commitments. After a week, you collect
a total of $90. You chip in an extra ten
so the teacher and aide will each have a $50 gift card. But
the teacher and aide both know that ten bucks per kid is the
norm. That means they know that half, or less than half, of the
parents didn’t contribute. That makes them feel unappreciated.
Really unappreciated, considering they’ve been spending
money from their own underpaid pockets all year long for
supplies the school board says they can’t afford. So, you go
back to the few parents you know who are sympathetic and
well-heeled enough to boost the amount up to $100 each,
therefore avoiding the embarrassment for both sides.
MAYDAY!
HUMOR
Problem solved, right? Oh, no, no, no. Silly you.
Problem just starting. Because you thought Visa gift
cards would be great — they could spend them
anywhere. Then, at the end-of-year class party,
which is attended by nearly all the parents, several
back you into a corner. I would like to interject at this
point that there are way too many adults dependent on
happy pills, and they tend to be the least happy
people. Doesn’t take long to figure out which
ones they are. They are the biggest and
loudest complainers, nearly bursting
with indignation. Another
segue here — why are the people
who don’t volunteer the hardest on
those who do?
One mom demands to know why she
wasn’t asked or consulted about a gift.
You discover the number on the class roster
actually belongs to her miserable, disgusting,
and sneaky ex. After hearing all about his
slimy affair, during which you frantically
dig for tissues in your purse because
now she’s sobbing, you find out he
never answers such calls, and why didn’t
you double-check it? Another tells you she
thinks giving teacher gifts are wrong and how
dare you sign her name to it? Still another, who
wears a $10,000 watch and drives a spanking
new Mercedes SUV, is upset because everyone
knows you should only give gift cards to office or
craft supply stores. Yeah, let’s give teachers a gift they
can use to buy more stuff for your child.
In the little children’s classes, they need decorations
and snacks for their party. I’m a well-known artsy
type, so I was pressured to do the decorations.
No problem, thought I. Easy-peasy. Cut out
some construction paper flowers and string
some pastel crepe paper rolls around. Nope.
The room mother, we’ll call her Gwen, decided
my elementary ideas were not
up to snuff. Unbeknownst
to me, there was a contest
for best spring decorations in the
school. Gwen needed me to step it up. To
win what, exactly?
May becomes a nightmare of class trips,
proms, and graduations, all requiring ample
parent participation. And every year sucks you
in deeper. All that work, all those hours, and
when your child gets to high school, they are
embarrassed to admit they have a mother,
much less one who actually shows up in their
school to do something.
May gives me a headache. P
by Victoria Landis
40
MAY 2016