First Day of School - Fall 2013

It's traditional on the first day of school to get a picture of the kids on their way out the door, but this year, I goofed up.  They were too fast or I was too slow or it was just one of those things that get lost in the shuffle of the busy-ness of life; either way, they got out the door before I was quite ready and the opportunity was nearly missed.

You can tell it wasn't posed or anything.  It's more like me standing on the porch yelling at them to "hold still!" while trying to get the camera turned on and focused.  And they're giving me that look that says, "Really? Do we have to do this?  We're not in elementary school anymore, Dad.  We're practically grown up!"

And they are.  Nearly grown up.  Just a few more years and they'll be heading out the door for good, off on their own life adventure, carrying with them all the knowledge and wisdom and practical facts we've been able to stuff into their heads.  Hoping it's enough to get them through.  Enough to keep them on the straight and narrow regardless of what the world has to throw at them.

It's odd having having them all nearly grown up now.  High school and college aged. Driving themselves around. Looking but not necessarily acting mature.  Tugging on the those apron strings, eager to get out into the world and be their own persons.

I grabbed a couple pictures of the girls as they were heading out to catch the bus. The first one looked very dark because the flash was on; the early morning sky wasn't really that dark, but the flash made it that way.  The second one had the right background light, but their faces were out of focus because I turned off the flash.  Maybe if you glance from one to the other really quick, back and forth, you'll get the idea of what it really looked like.

James was still fixing his lunch when I had to leave for work, so this is a picture of him making his famous peanut-butter-and-Nutella sandwhich.  It does taste pretty good.  Probably gives him a good protein boost for the day, too.

I didn't even think about getting a picture of Adam before he drove off to college.  Probably because his first class doesn't start til after ten which means he doesn't get up til nine, and I'm off to work by seven.  And I wasn't going to wake him up just to get a picture of him lying in bed trying to get a few more precious moments of sleep before his alarm went off.  Or wait around til he got up and breakfasted and showered and packed his stuff and headed out to his car to begin his day.  He's in college.  He's a sophomore. He should be able to handle himself by now.  And we tend to think of him as already gone anyway, since last year he was living on campus and not home until Sunday afternoon.  Even though he's living at home and commuting, but we've still got that he's-at-school-full-time mentality.

Cheryl has her first day of school today, too.  And she seems to be eager to get back into the swing of things, working with those very nice people in the music department at school.  It's a joy to be able to share some of those moments with her, getting together with the music directors and band leaders and other stafff members who work so hard to create a first-class musical program for the kids.  As it is a joy to have children who are very musically-inclined, who benefit directly from our involvement.

Hard to believe it's all started again. School.  Marching Band.  Jazz Band.  Musicals. Where did my summer go?  It's gone.  Vanished.  Disappeared like a vapor while I was at work.  That's so frustrating!  But nothing to do about it now.  Just gotta keep moving on.