Firsts and celebrating the moments.

Today is the first day of school for most of the kids in this area.  What an easy week you may think (I'm thinking the same thing) When I was growing up we started the day after Labor Day.  But I digress from the point of my thoughts.  In my many years of being a parent and now grandparent I have helped celebrate many things large and small and the cynical part of me can't help but think of the line from the Pixar movie, "The Incredible's," that refers to these minor celebrations as excuses for marking mediocrity.  From a certain point of view that comment may be true but from another point of view mediocrity is hardly what is being feted.  

Today Christopher started pre-school and for a three-year-old it was a big deal to spend half of his day with those who are not family for the first time in his life.  This kid has a hard enough time spending a few hours with grandma!  (all you family members can stop snickering now)  I walked up to the school at noon to pick him up since it is far more convenient for me to go three blocks than it is for his mom to pack his sister into the van and drive 6 miles to get him.  All the way back here he chattered on about birds, grass, big trucks, and where Uncle is today at the same speed that his little feet were going.  At a break in the conversation I asked him if he remembered whose birthday it was today and he immediately came back with "Mother Mary's birthday."

I then began to tell him how pleased she is that he was a good boy at school and how she is happy to help him learn if he only remembers to ask her each day for her help.  In unique little boy style he asked if he could have his lunch with Mother Mary and help her have a happy birthday.  No mediocrity in this celebration! The simplicity of the request and the plainness in the execution of the "party" are all the commemoration that his first day of school needs to fix it in his little boy memory forever.