Choosing Y

I'm typing with great hesitancy because there's enough of a third-grader left in me to believe that if I acknowledge the wondrous thing that seems to be happening, I will jinx it and the wonderful will all go away. But--into the breach she leaps, quietly [I'm whispering now]: We've just concluded our third conflict-free weekend in a row with 16-year-old Hugh. Yes, that's right. No arguments, no shrieking, no swearing, no slamming doors, not even any eye-rolling. How weird and wonderful is that?

The cynical me thinks, "yeah, it's just because you've been sick and so too doggone weary to fight." But that's not it because the point is, the sharp-skewering-eureka point is, that Hugh has not picked a fight. Which counts as a totally "holy cow!" development.

I imagine it's just serendipity, the right alignment of hormones and school successes and driving privileges and what Keith made for dinner. But I would like to believe, in fact I am going to believe until facts intrude and force me to believe otherwise (just hate those damn facts), that we, Keith and I, that we did this. At least in part. Because, you see, these good weekends follow a somewhat epic clash with Hugh's boarding school authorities. (Ok ok, maybe not epic, maybe not even supermarket paperback, still, this is our life, you know, so it does seem to matter.)

School. Such a strange thing, really. You have a baby and you obsess like mad over every little detail and then the baby is 5 and whoop, total strangers have control of him for most of the day. You can assiduously investigate various school options and agonize over private vs. public and spend huge chunks of your life touring facilities and reading brochures and interviewing principals--but in the end, he spends most of the day in the hands of individuals that you do not know and that you have no say in selecting. And you have to trust them, support them, back them up. . .particularly when you have a kid who tends to lie, so of course you believe the teachers and you align yourself with The Authorities and you lecture your kid about respect and consequences and obeying the rules even when he doesn’t think they make sense.

But sometimes you confront a situation in which your gut, your heart, your instinct, all cry out: something just seems awry. I’ve been in that situation, and made the wrong choice. When Hugh was 7, his classroom teacher became seriously ill and for three months he was in the hands of a substitute. Hugh's behaviour and academic work deteriorated immediately and I knew, no, I felt something was wrong, but I stuck with my head, ignored my heart, supported The Authorities, did as I was told—and hurt Hugh. The sub, from her first day, labeled Hugh as Bad and treated him as such--and "documented" it with vindictive glee in a little notebook that the regular teacher, horrified, discovered after she returned. And I let it happen.

"Err on the side of love.” I don’t know where I heard that, but it’s become my mantra. So now, here we are, several years later and the school says X and Hugh says Y, and everything I know and feel says only Y makes any sense--despite the record, the history, the apparent evidence.

Err on the side of love. We chose Y. At least, if I screw up my kid, it will be because I believed in him too much, trusted him too much, gave him too much of my heart and my soul. Not because I didn’t.