Possumblog

Electives

Had a thing to attend last night with Jonathan and Rebecca--an orientation meeting of sorts in the middle school gym, intended to inform parents about the elective class choices for 7th and 8th graders in the upcoming year.

Jonathan already had his filled out--he wants to take band for sure, and then either art, or piano/guitar. I'm not sure how you play a piano/guitar, but it still amazes me that anyone can play any sort of musical instrument, period, and even more amazing that I have kids who can do it. I just never could figure all that stuff out--I like to sing and all, and actually can figure out (if given enough time to look at it) how to read music. I guess the kids get it from their mama.

Rebecca didn't quite know what to take, until we were driving over and she started going down the list of stuff she DIDN'T want to take. After she'd eliminated those, she only had three choices left. Made the decision easier, to say the least. She finally decided to put down art as her second choice, yearbook as her third choice. First choice, foreign language.

Which is going to be interesting, in that they haven't hired the teacher for the class yet, and therefore no one knows what language will be taught.

Could be Spanish. Or French.

Or Urdu.

Although the former is more likely.

What will be funny is if it turns out to be a Latin teacher, and if that teacher also teaches it at the high school. Oldest is about to split a seam to take Latin, mainly because she already knows all about Latin from reading all the Harry Potter books. I, on the other hand, having watched Life of Brian, know that Latin is fiendishly convoluted. However, far be it from me to dissuade her from her obsessive delusion, because I really would like it if she learned Latin. I also have this selfish desire to witnessing the total shock that will overcome her when she realizes that there's more to it than "expecto patronum." But the funniest thing will be if Rebecca is taking it as well--the sibling competitiveness should make for quite the combustible household.

Good grief, what am I wishing for!?

Anyway, we pulled up to the gym and a herd of tanned, willowy, coltish, and incredibly attractive young maidens came pouring out of the building after cheerleading practice. Jonathan piped up, "Hey, that's X!" [Not her real name.] "And there's A! And B over by the door! And there's C and D and E and F and F' and X's cousin L!" He knew every one of them. I pulled in to a parking spot on the curb behind someone in a hulking Expedition, and one of the girls broke from the pack and got in the truck. "Hey, that's M!"

I couldn't help myself--"Good night, Son--she's pretty! How do you know all these girls!?" (Left unasked was how is it that 13 year old girls look like this [i.e., 20 year old supermodels] nowadays!?)

"Aw, I don't know--most of them I have class with."

"They're in your grade!?"

"Mmhm, yes sir."

Fascinating.

ON into the building, which was nice and breezy with the giant wall fans on. Unfortunately, these make more racket than a B-52, so when the program started, they were shut off. And thus the gym became like every other middle school gym you can imagine--hot, stuffy, and smelling of hormonal teenagers, floor wax, and dirty mop water.

And in the end, it really didn't help us any, because my kids had already made out their forms. This was really just to help those people who were undecided about what they wanted.

::sigh::

And it lasted an hour and a half. And included a herky-jerky PowerPoint presentation. And the microphone worked only 42.3% of the time. And despite the fact that I have ample padding, within three minutes of sitting down, my butt ached with an unimaginable intensity due to the shape and material of the hard bleacher seating. And to top it off, it meant that we missed going to hear Oldest in her last choir concert for the year.

Mom said they all did really well.

Posted by Terry Oglesby at May 3, 2006 10:47 AM