SOOC Saturday: The Last Day

The last day he is going to run out of the house to catch the bus, looking like this:

The last school morning I will be greeted by this parked out front:

The last morning I'll watch him say hi to his buddy, then race laughing to the end of the bus for the driver to catch him and help buckle him in his seat; the last time hearing the nice driver telling James to wave hi to Mommy ...

The last wave goodbye, throwing kisses all the way:

The last time down the street ...

The last turn around the corner, heading off to the last morning of preschool:

James almost didn't make it up the stairs and on the bus -- because up in the sky, just behind the bus, was this:

We'll see that one again, at least!
(told you I would be a mess as we wound up James' preschool era)

The Slurping Life is off to a great start for the July 4th weekend. Visit Melody and check out SOOC Saturday/Sunday entries past & present. No cropping or fixing -- it's life, straight out of the camera.





  

School, and a Rant

Wow, it didn't seem like there'd be a lot to do for school with James this year, but there was!

First day back was August 18th. Yikes!

Same school, room, and teacher. The new assistant for his classroom was his favourite SHAPE assistant from last year. Yay!!!

James is excited and engaged. Talking in phrases and sentences. Looking at peple and trying to talk with them. Doing some imaginative play and using the tricycle. Actually using the classroom swing for the First Time Ever. Starting on patty training Big Time. Awesome!

The school bus system, however is new. The school district brought that inhouse, to save costs. I know that there are going to be bugs in a new system, but the first day was so bad that I don't ever want to do it again.

First, the bus never showed up in the morning. At 9:00, I just threw in the figurative towel and drove him to school. I found out later that the bus had broken down and the bus arrived 2 HOURS late. Note that I found this out from James' teacher; the school's transportation people never bothered to call and tell me this, let alone apologise for the delay. Oh, and school is 3 hours long. Way to go.

Going home, the bus was a good 10 minutes late getting to the school. I know because I called his teacher at 12:25 to find out where he was. School lets out at noon, and we live *maybe* 10 minutes from the school. Last year the bus was never later than 12:15. I knew there were only 2 other local kids on that bus, and one of them lives down the street from us.

So I tried calling the bus coordinator. No answer. Left message to please call me because I want to know where my son is. I repeated this at least twice more. I guess they were out to lunch. In more ways than one. At 1:05 someone finally picked up the phone. She asked me to repeat myself ... someone was talking to her in the background and evidently it was more interesting than me. Then I was told no one knew where the bus was, and put on hold so she could call the driver. At 1:10 the bus pulls up *next door.* I am still on hold, so I hang up.

The bus driver could only shrug and tell me they were driving around all over. The wrong addresses were given and my son should have been first off the bus, not last. I said "Really, so you have been driving for an hour all over town?" (which, BTW, is small). He thinks for a minute and laughs and says "Yeah."

Un-friggin' believable.

So I canceled the bus service. I had to do it over via message machine because ... no one was answering the phone at this point. MUCH later in the afternoon, I got a call back saying they got my message. Would I want to try again next week? Not bloody likely. Oh.

Are these people for real? A busload of Special Needs kids, 2 of 3 who have trouble talking, goes missing for an hour and oh-that-shouldn't-have-happened-but-it's-the-first-week-you-know is the best they can do? I will never know what happened to my son on that bus. I am hoping that it was nothing except a lot of driving. But I will never know.

Oh, and if they know it's a new system and things happen in the first week, why did they just walk away during the homeward route and leave the transportation line unmanned? Especially considering their less than stellar performance that morning? If their lunch break is more important to them than getting my son home safely then I will never use their system again.

Has anyone else gone through something like this? I am not a panicky mom (worried and stressed, you bet, but call-the-cops-my-kid-is-missing, no) and I was on Red Alert.

Oh, and I am staying tuned on what SHAPE will look like for him this year. He only has 2 of 5 days a week covered. And he keeps wanting to take naps because that person can only come later in the afternoon. Then there is the CATS program to consider. Hopefully I should hear in a few weeks what that will look like.

I think I will schedule him for a class that I can take him to on either Friday mornings or a weekday afternoon. Sitting and waiting is not my forte.

This is James: Bus

In the mornings, James adores the school bus. He practically rips open our front door and flies down the driveway, crying "buh! buh!" before he leaps into it. The driver always has a big smile for him and calls him her Little Angel. He giggles, wiggles, and glows with delight while he gets webbed into his seat. Then he'll look at me and shout "Bye!" with a grin.

I always wave to him outside the bus. And James always leans over and puts one finger up to the window. I can see him saying "bye" inside. He doesn't stop until I put my finger to his (on the other side of the glass) and say "Bye James, I love you!" Once I drew a heart too, and he thought that was the Coolest Thing Ever.

Then I wave to him as the bus pulls away from the curb. I wait for the turnaround and wave to him as he passes by, and I stand at the bottom of the driveway and wave some more until the bus turns the corner & out of sight. Mission completion!

Random Bus Thoughts:

1. Sometimes I have trouble getting James to focus, or sit still for socks and shoes. Usually, all it takes is a reminder: "James, bus" and presto, he is on board!


2. I wish I could get going as quickly as he -- angelically asleep to completely awake and demanding "muh-muh" (muffins) in 4.1 seconds.


3. James almost always makes my day happy with his starry smile and big happy eyes


4. The bus keeps me honest for getting James to school on time -- yay honesty!


5. I am so glad he gets an adventure so early in the day, while I am still working on that first cuppa joe