The first day of school ~ September 6, 1990

David Heiller

Monday night, Sept. 3, 9:15. Mollie can’t sleep. She creaks down the steps for about the fourth time tonight. That’s not unusual. She’s a great staller.

She crawls onto my lap at the kitchen table, and I hug her like a warm blanket. No yelling tonight. It’s a special night for us all.

“I still can’t sleep,” she says.

“Are you thinking about school?^” She nods, then raises her hand. “You have to raise your hand in school,” she says. “But not at nap time. You can’t raise your hand at nap time.” Noah has been teaching her the kindergarten ropes.

Up a tree, where Noah and Malika liked to be.

“I’m sad because I want to graduate,” she con­tinues, her eyes focused on a batch of fresh peanut butter cookies behind me.

“You can’t graduate until the end of the year,” I say. “First you have to go to school and learn a lot of things and be a good girl.” She nods duti­fully, still eyeing the cookies. She’s not worried about school at all, I suddenly realize. She’s worried about not getting to eat a fresh cookie.

“Would you like a cookie?” She nods again; I break one in half and send her upstairs.

 Something’s wrong. Normally Mollie would not get a hug and a cookie on Monday night at 9:15. But the first day of school does strange things to people.

Even to Mollie. Mollie the Youngest. Mollie the Staller. Mollie the Wild. Mollie the Paint-Orange-Paint-All-Over-Your-Body.

That was only three years age. I could have shipped her out to kindergarten that night, one at a boarding school very far away. There’s still orange paint on the floor by her bed.

There were other times too. All parents know what I mean. Times when you want to cut wood, or roof the shed, or bake bread or hang out clothes. Things that HAVE to get done, and a lit­tle kid keeps asking questions or wanting juice or wanting to share a favorite book or Sesame Street episode. You sigh and make time and like an idiot, you begrudge it a bit.

This all ends tomorrow, the first day of school. Mollie’s sad because she can’t graduate yet, and sadder still because she wants a cookie. She doesn’t realize the sticky mess called school—and growing up—that she is about to run into, and she’s lucky for that.

Noah is explaining the bus ride to Malika, 
meanwhile Queen Ida is nervous about them being gone.

Moms and Dads realize it, and it takes on more meaning for them. Like adults, they make a big deal about it. They’ve been bracing for it for a while, mentioning it while hanging up the clothes. “Won’t it be strange having Mollie in school?” Answering, “Yeah, wow.” but not really knowing that your gut feels like an empty house, echoing with stillness. Until now.

I’ve felt it a few times before. It comes at times of departure: a broken romance, the end of summer camp, the first day in college. I remember when I was leaving for the Peace Corps in 1977. Mom drove me to the airport in La Crosse. I felt nervous, excited, starting a great two-year adventure. I thought Mom shared those feelings, and maybe she did. But she cried as we hugged at the airport, like I hadn’t seen her cry in years.

Those tears surprised me then, but I understand them better now.

Tuesday morning, Sept. 4, 7:10: Mollie and Noah wait for Dave Nyrud’s school bus to pull into the driveway. They both wear back-packs big enough to carry a pup tent. These are children of the ‘90s.

We hear the bus down-shifting at Williams' to pick up April and Rosie. Mollie holds her arms out for me to pick her up. I hug her tight. “Why don’t you stay home?” I tell her. “We can watch The Little Mermaid all day.”

She laughs. She knows I’m joking. But she says “No” anyway, and she means it. She wouldn’t miss the first day of school for anything.