A Difficult Decision

I've come up against a few hurdles trying to arrange home schooling for William for 1 day a week.  The head teacher at his school is very supportive of the idea, which has been very encouraging, because 1 day a week will give us a good balance.  It will satisfy my need to be closer to my son while he is still so young, and he will benefit by more daytime one-to-one with me, yet he will still spend most of his week socialising at school.  And, I've got all these ideas about what we can do together that just aren't really possible at the end of a school day.

Up to now, progress had been glacial.  I first brought up the idea with the head teacher on the first day of term in early September. Initially, I think she was quite surprised - it was an unusual request.  However, we had a few meetings to discuss things, and she could see where I was coming from and was won over.  We even left things on one occasion where she would investigate the possibility using an 'educated off-site' code to apply to his attendance. 

Attendance.  That's the big issue.  The school's, that is.  They have problems keeping their numbers up, despite 'interventions'.  I'm guessing this is something to do with the catchment area and pupil mix.  Now, I don't fully understand schools in England.  There are so many different kinds now: state, voluntary aided, grammar, and so on.  Our Lady of the Immaculate is a voluntary aided Catholic primary school, so, as far as I understand it, they are answerable to the local authority and the board of governors.  So, my wishes have been vetoed by the Attendance Officer, and the governers weren't too keen either.  The ironic thing is that William's attendance is likely to be very high: he is not often very poorly, and we never take him out just on a whim.  Also, they don't have the resources to monitor what we are doing, despite my idea to keep a portfolio with pictures, projects, evidence of our activities.  I did scrunch up my eyebrows at this point.  The idea of monitoring seems a bit Big Brotherish.   

So, they can't officially sanction it.  It is a disappointing outcome, especially as I had understood that flexi-schooling was an agreement between the school and the parent, and not really anything to do with the local authority.  A shame because it looked like there was going to be a good partnership between parent and school.

As I had been worrying that this might happen, the prospect of home schooling full-time has crossed my mind several times recently.  It's a decision I've been grappling with because William is clearly enjoying his experience at school and is flourishing.  His teacher is so kind, exactly what I'd hoped for for him in his first year there.  And, I lack the full support of my dear husband on completely de-registering.  So, back to square one.  How can we capture those precious moments, steeped in learning together in these tender early years when, too quickly, the weeks slip by with the obligatory routines and schedule of life?

The Squirrel Mentality

It is a curious mixture of envy and empathy that I feel when I think of those people who just have five versions of the same outfit so there is no time wasted deciding what to wear and something clean each day.  Luxury.  It's not that I really have trouble deciding what to wear anymore though; these days, I just wear the same thing for five days.  The underwear drawer only needs to be opened about 2 inches because the top 5 or 6 pairs just get recycled.  I cannot remember what lurks deeper in the drawer, let alone when I last wore any of it.

Since space is such a premium here, I could always open the drawer a bit further, take out everything that is beyond 2 inches deep and throw it out.  I obviously don't need any of it to survive day to day.  If I did that to all the drawers in the chest (the same thing happens to a greater or lesser degree in each of the others), I could just then amalgamate everything into one drawer, and maybe, perhaps just put away some clutter, or better yet, enjoy the lightness of the drawers as I open them, their uncrammedness.  Sigh.  Unfortunately, it would only be a matter of time before they just filled up again.

I was never that good at clearing things out, being raised by a war-born hoarder, make-do-and-mender.  This does present a dilemma for me.  Whilst there is something I love about making do and mending, I am quickly overwhelmed by the creeping presence of clutter.  In recent times, I have become better at throwing out, but now have even less time and space to to it because of the demands of the children and family life.  So, every day is a dance of reordering, half-finished consolidating and picking it up and putting it down again after thinking the better (or worse) of it.  Yes, I can use that cardboard fruit pastilles tube (for some unspecified children's craft project).  No, I have looked at it 25 times lying there, nagging at me to be decisive about its fate.

[No photo this time - who wants to look at clutter?!]

My squirrel mother always said to me that as soon as you throw it out (even if you haven't worn/used it for 20 years) you'll think of a use for it the next day.  Now, there are flaws to this kind of guilt-inducing reasoning.  One is that of course you'll think of a use because you've just been reminded of its presence in the cupboard when, if you had just given permission to a trusted spouse/friend/etc to throw anything from said bag/container out without giving you so much as a chance at a glance, then you'd have, quite happily, remained none the wiser.  The other flaw is that it possibly stifles creativity because, if said item is just so perfect for x/y/z, that doesn't allow you the freedom to consider what alternatives you do have that CAN be put to good use.

The squirrel oft chirrups "a place for everything and everything in its place".  Sadly, the reality is more like "a thing for every other thing and everything squeezed in between 2 other things".  When I do have the rare occasion to go through some bursting nook or cranny, I rediscover some previous efforts at consolidation lying therein and spend a moment marvelling at how times and needs change, and even values, and the sometimes mind-boggling processes I went through once upon a time deciding to stow away such paraphernalia.

My dear husband is a passive accumulator of things (by passive, I mean, just genuinely inattentive to disposal and order with the daily trappings of life), whereas I am cursed (genetically) to be the active one.  This is very dangerous, since we took on our rented garage to give us more flexibility with the space constraints in the house.  "But it's a wonderful restoration project", I squeal, when in fact, if I really look around, there is a wonderful restoration project around every corner and I could afford to let this one go.  Maybe.

Freedom is that moment when I can simultaneously say "to hell with it" and throw it out and reconcile myself to being more creative with what's left over, turning that guilt into inner peace.

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NB The strong caveat throughout here is of minimal waste to landfill, "throwing out" being a general term for passing on, recycling, giving to charity, making a concerted effort to use up, or if all else fails, committing to waste.  My newest challenge is how to maintain inner peace and household harmony and use the bin less. I am uncomfortable knowing that most of what we throw in the bin will long outlast us in landfill, in some cases, by hundreds of years.  That is a sobering thought.