Gosh, I feel like we got off to a rough start this school year. There was the whole locker incident and then Anna was diagnosed with another UT infection. It's been a month of back and forth with the doctor's office trying to make sure the infection is gone. Thanks, spina bifida. And then there's everything that's been going on with my dad. (He was supposed to come home today, but that was changed to "sometime next week.") And the cold virus that was going around school less than a week in that knocked me on my butt.
Back to the locker incident. The school was not able to determine what happened. I suspect reviewing hours upon hours of video footage fell lower and lower on the priority scale as time moved on. And I get it. I once held a real job and I understand how that works. The school did assist with replacing some of the "lost" items though.
I feel the need to paint a better picture of the school's population. There's speculation that a child in need stole the items. I still do not believe this is the case for a couple of reasons. There is only a small percentage of kids who need financial assistance. Based on demographics, I'd say that's approximately 10%. In addition, the school and community both provide backpacks and school supplies to those who need these items. Now, I understand there may be a kid who still needs stuff despite all this, but how many kids could that be? AND what's the chance that this kid was able to get into Anna's locker (she now insists that she had secured the lock) and clean it out without anyone noticing? I still think it was someone in her homeroom who saw her combo when she was practicing and dumped everything in an empty locker not in their hall. I did have one specific boy in mind but the girls told me he's lazy and they couldn't see him pulling off a heist of that caliber.
As the principal told me and I agree, with the number of unattended personal items in the school, there are very few thefts. There is a huge "lost and found" table full of jackets and other items that is constantly cram packed. So much so that the schools will announce at least once a year that if items aren't picked up, they will be donated. Last year, I was surprised to see kids running out of the school within seconds of the last bell. The girls told me that some kids pack up their backpacks and leave them sitting outside their lockers, or leave their lockers unlocked or slightly open for a quick getaway. There's so much opportunity for items to be swiped, but they're not.
So the girls are holding their own with grades and such. Some nights, they have quite a bit of homework and other nights, not so much. I feel like this is when real teen stuff starts creeping up on parents but thus far, we haven't had any issues, aside from tween attitude. There was the night I went upstairs and I knew no one had been vaping, but there was this weird smell, so I asked if anyone had been smoking anything. The girls were horrified I would even ask the question because they would never do that. Turns out it was the cardboard from a delivery box. It must have gotten wet (or something), but it didn't smell like wet cardboard. (My kids still ask for permission to watch television (even though I tell them they don't need to) and to have a snack when it's not a typical time to have a snack so right now, I have zero concerns when it comes to smoking and drinking.)
Last commentary on school. There's already been quite a bit of teamwork type classwork this year and I am not a fan. Neither are the girls. I understand and agree with some of it but not the ones that are graded and your grade is partially dependent on a team member who is not of your choosing. I've been telling the girls for years now it's to prepare them for the workplace, where there is always at least one deadbeat.
Dance is still the big activity. The girls were moved up to the next competition team and they gladly accepted the challenge. They did sign up for fall running club because it doesn't interfere with dance. I feel like they have a good mix of busy time without being over-scheduled.
Speaking of running, I'm on week 6 of "resting." Even though I haven't been running, I've still had moments when I step on that ankle (usually getting out of bed) and there's pain. Based upon what I read during my tendinitis research, it sounds like what I thought was "cracking" may actually be the tendons slipping in and out of place. Awesome. I've come this far so I think I'm going to give it a few more weeks of rest (aside from my weekly tap class where I stupidly stand there during jump shuffles) before I attempt to run again. And this time, I won't make the mistake of jumping into 3 miles every other day. When it was still 75+ degrees out, I told myself I would ride my bike when the temperature dropped. Nope, not happening. So basically I've been in sloth mode.
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