A bittersweet day today. Kindergarten is starting and that means some of the kids I've grown attached to will be moving on the real school.
One boy, call him Andre, has already stopped coming to preschool. I saw him outside with his mom and sister, Kaiah. It was nice to be able to say good bye, wish him well in school and tell his mother again what a good boy he is and that I think he will do great in school.
The first day I had him in preschool, he was kicking me. I told him he couldn't be my friend if he kicked me, and he made the right choices, mostly, from then on.
I have eyes that are connected directly to my heart. Especially my right eye. Whenever I'm feeling something deeply, it wells up. I can't stop it. Because of this, I often act a harder ass than I would otherwise be.
Jamal is going, too. He, like, Andre, is an attractive boy and enjoys some of the crazier play I come up with. Each morning I come in, he is drawing or coloring a Spongebob Squarepants. He's sharp with his letters and can work with concepts. He, too, will do fine.
Last, there's Carmine. If they were remaking the Mouseketeers today, the casting directors would put her in the front row. She has an unrehearsed sparkle that could launch a thousand teen pageant moms. She's first with the answers, often anticipating the question. Today, she showed me her muscles. Last week, she filled a chalk board with the teacher's opening monologue. The words lacked many of the letters, but you could tell what it was. I can write it, she said said, because I have brains in my head.
Indeed she does.
Near the end of gym today, her big toe in open sandals got run over by a trike. It bled under the nail, and I ministered to her wound, carried her back across the threshold to the class room and wrapped on a bandage.
In her honor, and Jamal's, I stayed for lunch. It may not have mattered to them, but I knew this was the last I'd see of them.
I gave Carmine a little pep talk about how great I thought she was and how well she was going to do in school. I said, you can go to college. You will be able to do anything you want, Carmine. I was trying to load up good karma that would somehow propel her through the next 13 years. Impossible, of course.
I'm just this guy who showed up once a week for a few months — who felt her muscles and announced her flips and put a bandage on her toe. She will have to do it herself, and there is a lot arrayed against her gifts, many people ready to suck out her sparkle, as if they could have it for themselves.
Have you thought about what you want to be when you grow up?, I asked, and she said: A mom. Presumably like the woman who has delivered her here, so whole, so far. You can be a mom and more, I said.
In masonry walls, it is necessary to leave weep holes so the inner moisture can get out and not compromise the structure. Yes, I tell myself, it is good to have weep holes at times like these.
