Week End

Thank goodness last week is over and this is a new one! Tomorrow morning I play tennis early at a club that has a reputation for being very rule-bound, but any day that includes tennis is a good one. Some very screwed up version of child dispersement seems to be in the works. I'm just going to sit back and let it happen, rather than trying to talk sense into Rebecca and Hilary.

I seem to have managed to alienate myself completely from my homeschool group and piss the hell right out of everyone. All just more evidence, not that I need any more, that you can't lose friends you never had in the first place. No one is speaking to me. They're speaking to everyone else...and that was kind of the problem to begin with. I have the impression that the root of the problem is that whether anyone wants to be with me or my children or not in the first place, my presence in the co-op is vital because there just has to be a co-op so that the Consolidation of Activity needs of people who live outside of town will be met. I hate to sound callous, but I can't make this my problem. I can't do something that isn't going to bring us pleasure and where I feel uncomfortable just because it makes life more convenient for other people. This was not a situation where my children or me were going to be successful, and the stress it would cause me on so many levels just was not worthwhile. I have to go with my convictions and with what I feel is right, both Right right and right for my famly as it is right now (how's that for a lot of rights?).

I actually feel this tremendous sense of relief. And finally a lot of optimism about next year. I hadn't realized what a weight this co-op was on me and how it was dragging down my whole enthusiasm for homeschooling until the real issues for me bubbled up to the surface the other night. The nagging discomfort that we were excluding some people I knew would be interested and that they would find out about the co-op and I would be implicated in the exclusion. The undercurrent of knowing but not articulating that there are people in the co-op who just don't particularly like my family. We're not talking 20 families and having a conflict with 1 or 2, we're talking about 6 families and having trouble with 20-40%. The uneasiness in having heard or interpreted that my children aren't really challenging enough academically. There were just a lot of uncomfortable things. When you start out at the planning stages with discomfort, it's hard to see how things could possibly be going swimmingly when November rolls around and we're still locked into the thing. I'm homeschooling so we can do things that work for us, and while I can handle a commitment to something as well as anyone else most of the time once I'm in, it just makes no sense at all to initiate something that you know already isn't right. What really pissed everyone off was not just me saying that, to put it most bluntly, I felt like people were being mean, but that when I left, Hilary left and now maybe another family is going to leave. Hilary was going to leave anyway, so my leaving wasn't the final straw, and if I hadn't sent an email first, she would have beat me to it. I'm still kind of in confusion as to how anyone can be upset that I "wrecked their co-op by pulling out" when some of them didn't particularly want to work with me and my children in the first place!

So now I'm on to being part of the advisory committee on this new homeschool enrichment center that is opening. I want to have positive energy to put into that. I'm nearly giddy with the idea that I have an opportunity now to really think about what I'd like to do with other families should other families be interested in doing things with me. I tend to not be that much of a rock the boat kind of person. I err on the side of sticking around just a little too long most of the time, long past the point when I should have bailed for my own sanity and self-preservation. My typical M.O. is to just kind of fade off into the background when I have a problem, and eventually I evaporate and move on to something else. I don't tend to make these clean (or unclean) cuts. But what better time than when this new Homeschool Place is right on the horizon to have released myself into becoming a free agent? And the sense that my weeks belong to me now is very thrilling.

I'm working on getting us into a different co-op that isn't really a co-op. It's more of a schoolish offering, but still sounds fun. Although tonight i noticed that they are using a writing program that I think has a great deal wrong with it in its basic philosophy, so this has made me waver just a little bit. I don't remember hearing much about them doing writing, so I'm not sure what this exactly means in terms of this year. I'd have a lot to 'unteach' if they were taught by this method, because I have strong feelings about teaching forms and teaching style, particularly to younger students who don't have enough filters and critical thinking skills to swerve away from this on their own. Right now there is no room in this group, though, so it's not exactly a sure thing at the moment. If I had this Classical Conversations thing on Tuesday, though, and was able to get together for another group learning time on Thursdays with some friends, then my week would feel pretty complete. Mondays I'd probably teach a class or two at the Homeschool Center, and Wednesdays and Fridays would be free. I'm still on the fence about trumpet for Walter (far away, bisects day, takes a time that used to be park day, but more on that in a minute). I'd really rather keep teaching the kids piano, and eventually move toward finding a Woodlake piano teacher for them later in the year. Frances would have her gymnastics on Tuesday and Thursday evenings, whoever chose to would have wrestling in the winter, and we'd have open space in our schedule for playdates and impromptu things. It sounds pretty good. And it really makes me take back nearly every thought I've had about putting them in school. Finally, I can look forward to the fall!

So that's where I am now. Spoke bluntly and made people dislike me. Probably am leaving the homeschool group I've been with for at least 2 years, and 3 if you want to get technical. And yet I feel a massive surge of potential and confidence. I feel better about my children, energized about what we will do at home over the summer and next year, and I'm back experiencing the freedom that made me choose to homeschool in the first place!