We had a wonderful celebration at the Co-Op Friday, our end of year moving-on ceremony. It is the time each year where our oldest children (some of whom have spent as many as three years with us, or even longer, if their older siblings had attended prior to them, in which case, the graduating kids we may have known even before their mother became pregnant). Because of these kiddos especially, I usually avoid saying the word "goodbye" rather I choose to say "Until next time" or "Until we meet again." Truth is, many of these children whom are soooooo connected to us and whom we have hugged and comforted many times over, will move on through life, never looking back, which I totally understand, after all, it's only preschool for goodness sakes.
Something though that has been occurring these past few years has been to reconnect with many of them through Facebook, now that they are teenagers, and/or even young adults now. For instance, even my own two boys, whom are both alumni from San Anselmo Cooperative Preschool too, are already ages 22 and 19. When my older son had begun in 1991, I had just given birth to my younger one, so he was one of those kiddos who has an even deeper connection with the place, having already been comfortable there even before his very first official day of school, nearly three years later.
Anyhow, back to this year's moving-on ceremony. We have many traditions which have continued through the years, and each year, due to the various parents involved in the planning, there is a uniqueness of it's own anyways. This year, for the first time, one of our moving on girls, who's father composes music for a living, surprised us by joining in a duet with her father, singing a song which seriously brought tears to all three of us teacher's eyes, as well as most of the people in the audience. Although we usually get choked up every year (because no matter what, there is sadness in knowing that these kiddos may grow up and soon forget the times you spent comforting them when they missed their moms, or kissed their boo boo's, or helped them through a difficult moment with another child, or listened to their dreams and stories, or the wonder you saw in their eyes as they made a magical discovery from an activity you prepared, or the special moments where their laughter was absolutely contagious and happy times were shared. But this year, the moment the father/daughter duo broke into the song, we couldn't hold back. We were absolutely touched beyond words.
Soon afterwards, more of our amazingly talented musician parents began singing a song, especially written about our school, through the eyes of their experiences and let me tell you that one got us howling because some of the lyrics were soooo true, yet almost too true to have to read in black and white like that. But that is the point, it's all part of being part of such a community of families, whom are actually experiencing these things for themselves on days they are acting as the co-oping parent/teacher's (unlike many preschools, where parents drop off their children and then pick them up without having spent any time in the school when all the action is actually occurring, so they don't feel quite as connected with the experience, which I, personally, couldn't imagine choosing, what so ever). I'll post a link to the lyrics of this funny co-op graduation day song later so you can see what I'm trying to say here.
But the absolutely BIGGEST TEAR JERKER occurred when one of the songs sung was one we sing often with the children that goes:
"I love my mommy, I love my mommy, yes it's true, yes it's true, and she loves me too, and she loves me too, yes she does…. yes she does"
"I love my daddy, I love my daddy, yes it's true, yes its' true, and he loves me too, and he loves me too, yes he does, yes he does."The words can continue like this for quite some time as you can imagine, when the children are involved in who to include such as grandparents, siblings, friends, relatives, pets, Yoda, etc. But on this particular day, for me, it was especially meaningful because I had the gift of both of my own parents there to join in the festivities. It was one of their first stops on their way towards Canada, in their RV. They have come to this ceremony one other time and seemed to enjoy it so much that they hope to make it a tradition from now on. I'll get into the rest of my visit with them in the following posts, but back to my reason for bringing them up on this particular day. Can you imagine the words being sung, as I'm gazing right at my mother during I Love my mommy….. and she loves me too…..? Then, I Love my daddy……. and he loves me too, etc. Here is where the tears were flowing but luckily these ones were pure tears of joyful love that they were actually there for real for me to sing it to them. Pure heaven is all I have to say. It was such a perfect day, too, couldn't have asked for better weather (which believe it or not, we were actually concerned about for the first time in all my years working there, because just one week before, we were still experiencing the rainy season. Spring nearly didn't occur at all with all the endless rain. So once again, I am grateful for a glorious June morning at San Anselmo Co-Op.
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