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On the Bus
By Johanna Wald
Next week, I will put my daughter on the bus to kindergarten.
I have been through this before. Two years ago, I released my 5-year-old son's tightly clutched hand, hugged him closely and edged toward the sidelines as he took that monumental step upward into the black hole of that bus. For one terrifying instant, Brendan disappeared into the belly of that massive yellow void, until I could locate him biting his lip and blinking fiercely through a murky window. I gamely smiled as the bus resoundingly shut its doors, and propelled him into a no man's land beyond my sphere of vision and influence. In a time honored parental tradition, I walked home and burst into tears for an hour.
My son had been in daycare since he was a toddler; so morning separation was not the issue here. But we both recognized the significance of this ride. Public school is an "institution" that is not as warm, fuzzy or parent-friendly as preschool. Kids have to learn to cope with lines, bells, new rules and rituals, and hallways filled with strange big and little people. No matter how nurturing the teacher, there is a terror associated with the first day of kindergarten. On top of that, I had to muster up the faith that the bus would somehow safely deliver him to a school located on the other side of town, and that responsible adults would be on hand to usher him safely to his classroom. One part of me felt as if I was abandoning him to a jungle.
Within a week, our emotional equilibrium had returned, and Brendan had mastered the mechanics of the bus ride to school. Yet, throughout the fall, I noticed that when any aspect of his routine varied, he became unglued. He raced off the bus in tears one morning after he realized there was a substitute driver at the wheel. He took notice when the radio station changed or the bus diverged from its usual route. One afternoon he emerged from the bus clearly ashen. The kids had discovered they were on a new vehicle, and this knowledge had sparked furtive whispers; were they all headed toward the wrong destination? My heart breaks every time I imagine a busload of 5-year-olds, anxiously peering out the window for familiar landmarks, terrified that they were going to be dumped at an unknown location to be greeted by strange parents.