living arrows

(saying goodbye to the school run)

Today is the first day of school and my youngest son has set off down the steps to meet his friends on the corner, his golden head fading into milky morning light. He is entering his last year of primary school and, as of this morning, he will be walking there without me. For the past eleven years I have walked at least one of my children to school, and now, suddenly, I am released. I will gain an extra hour in every school day, but I will lose something too—tiny, intimate moments, an imperceptible thread of connection. I don’t remember my last ever school run—in the same way that I don’t remember the last time I ever nursed a baby—these interactions have been a part of the fabric of my life, too commonplace to consider, until, one day, they weren’t.

I’d like to think that the last time was sunny, that my boy was cheerful. Perhaps he skipped as we crossed the road and put his hand quietly in mine, only to remove it later—equally quietly—when we turned a corner and ran into one of his friends. I imagine we chatted and that he had questions to ask me—he always asks excellent questions. Afterwards, when I had dropped him at school, I probably wandered home in a daze, already thinking of my desk, and the words I would sit down to write. I don’t remember one last school run because hundreds are melted together in my memory. All those years of rushing and rain have already slipped into parenting’s past. I mourn their loss—as I knew I would—but I also know it is time to let my boy fly:

‘You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.’ - Kahil Gibran

And so, I’m sharing with you a piece I wrote a decade ago when school run days had just begun—my children were still tiny and I had my first proper writing gig, as a columnist for a family magazine. This is The School Run:

The school run. Three small words that can evoke a sense of dread. It sounds so simple, bucolic, even: walking children to school. Yet a fifteen minute trip can feel like an epic journey, and the time between waking and leaving the house is so often a desperate struggle. I find myself stuck in a gruelling cycle of remonstration and coercion, with battles over brushing teeth, getting dressed, eating breakfast and other morning minutiae. In those instants, as I try my hardest to shepherd three small children out of the house on time, feelings are at their most raw and visceral. The school clock is ticking, we dare not be late.

On the bad days, I am literally running. I plough down the high street, hot and harassed, pushing a buggy with two grumpy children trailing in my wake. My hair unbrushed, my face bare of makeup, I am relieved that I remembered at the final moment to kick off my slippers and zip up my boots. On days like these, there’s a choice to be made: shower or breakfast? Sometimes, I will catch a glimpse of myself in a shop window: clothes thrown on at random, shadows under my eyes that concealer couldn't touch (even if I had remembered to apply it). What a yawning gulf between this chaotic reality and the magazines I have seen with 'school runway' fashion columns—glossy-maned, perfectly made-up mamas posing nonchalantly by the gates.

Thankfully, not every day is like the one where the wheel fell off the buggy half way down the road, the three year old screamed every inch of the way, and the five year old trod in a dog poo. On the good days, I remembered to lay out the children's clothes the night before. I set the breakfast table and I made packed lunches ahead of time. On days like these there is time to apply mascara and even a smudge of blusher.

Of course there are many mornings when we walk peacefully, when we notice the sunrise-tinged sky laced with aeroplane trails. We chat about what the eldest will be doing at school that day, and the three year old shows me the treasure he has found between the cracks in the pavement. I hold his hand tightly in mine and remember that one day—fast approaching—all three will walk to school on their own, and I shall mourn for the time when a snail on the path always required rescuing and a zebra-crossing could not be navigated unaided.

I think, then, of the advice I was given when bringing each of my babies into the world: remember to breathe. On good days, take deep, appreciative breaths, be grateful for fresh air, bright eyes and togetherness. On bad days, stay calm and breathe through it all: the tantrums, the tears, the endless negotiations.

I breathe in, I breathe out…and then I pick up my heels and run. The school bell waits for no one.

‘Life’, Kahil Gibran wrote, ‘goes not backward’. This September, the school bell still continues to ring, but I do not hear it. I pick up my heels again and I run headlong into the ‘one day’ that I somehow never quite expected to come. A new space is opening up and I do not yet know what I will discover there.

I think I am ready to find out.

Thank you for reading,

Laura x

PS: Sadly there are no free first day of school cupcakes where I live! The above image is from my recent trip to Vermont to visit my brother.

PPS: If, like me, you love Kahil Gibran’s On Children, you may like this beautiful rendition by Sweet Honey In The Rock.