Kids School

Since we moved to Brazil, I have taken on the role as Mr. Mom. It’s been challenging for a guy who spent the last 20 plus years working a hectic job of odd hours and long trips away from home. This caring and feeding of kids was never a full-time job for me. Now don’t get me wrong, I am loving it! The boys have done a total reverse and are more attached to me now. Before it was always the fall and get hurt yell for Mommy, now its Daddy. Sometimes I get busy and think “oh crap, did I feed the kids lately.” Usually I have or I ask if they are hungry and they already got a snack. They are at an age where they can help themselves, which is a good thing.

Currently I am Mr. Mom, full time student completing my MBA on-line (teach yourself), teach English to about 5 clients and complete most of the chores around the house. Yeah, I know most of my friends think I’m living the life of luxury and don’t do much, but I can say my days are jammed packed. Currently I have a load of laundry in…specifically the pants and other types of shorts. I’m positive there is probably another name for the classification of these types of cloths, but I don’t know what to call it. I break it down like this: Pants & shorts, shirts, underwear & sock, kids school uniforms, delicate stuff and towels. The only white stuff is usually kids uniforms which wash by themselves. Well anyways that’s some of the crap I’m doing today and I’m not very good at it. They smell good in the end and some of the stains come out.

Sometimes I miss a few things and I will tell a short story about what I missed this morning. Like every Monday – Friday morning I am up at 0630 to get kids to school by 0735. Yes, that early, but they get off at 1200 to come home. A little different then the full days like American kids do. Dressed, breakfast, the scramble to get to school at a decent time. As we are walking in I see the sign up for end of year parent teacher conferences. A highly valued get signed up now before it fills up and I can’t align the times so both kids will have their meetings close to the same time. I sent the kids on their way to the classrooms while I heroically jumped into the mix of crazy moms to get my coveted spots.

Yes, I am the only everyday drop and pick up the kid’s dad. Some of the other dads do it a few times a week but not every day. I know, that I’m not that good at seeing upcoming events and planning for stuff that a mom would realize. After my victory of getting great times for the parent teacher conferences, I head over to the outdoor area where they do events at the school. I knew my youngest kid had been practicing singing each day for the past few weeks and this was the day to sing for us parents. He told me every day that his teacher was mean for making him sing and he hated it. Complained he would get thirsty and she always was making him sing louder. I thought it was funny!

Well as I am sitting front row seat, a victory! I get a call from my wife…not happy wife. She says, “teacher just called and is very mad that our son doesn’t have a monkey costume on.” Well the costume part was a complete surprise to me. “it was in his journal to have a costume for today.” I didn’t see a memo to have one, sorry. “well fix it or go explain to him why he can’t sing this morning.” As you can see from this conversation, I am in big trouble and it’s not a possibility to have a monkey costume in 10 minutes. I could make him into an army dude or burglar by getting some grease from the car engine and rubbing it on his face. Not an option though, its toxic and wouldn’t go with the animal theme the teacher was going for.

I get up from my prized seat and head to the classroom, as I walk in he is facing away from me. I’m not sure what to expect when I kneel beside him. I say “hey buddy I’m really sorry, I didn’t know about the monkey costume.” He is not upset at all but says “does this mean I don’t have to sing?’’ Right then and there I knew this was a good thing. I told him I missed it in the journal that I sometimes look at and then tell him he can come home for the day. He practically danced his way to the car and was so happy not to have to sing those horrible songs.

I feel bad that I missed this and he didn’t get the experience to sing in front of the school. I plan to pay more attention and not get caught up in the other stuff I got going on. In the end, I realized that it ended up good! He was happy to not sing, skip school, poop at home, play on his I-Pad, etc. I got the best times for parent teacher conference, had front row seat (which is rare) and got to spend time with the youngest while I did the laundry this morning and he talked to me while he pooped. It’s hard to hold an I-Pad at that time and he makes that the dad let’s talk time.

Thanks for reading,

A very happy and grateful Daddy