Season's End

Clare took some pictures of Sean's Final Game of the Season. Sean is in the foreground in this picture which I borrowed from her-- he is #14.

Today, he will turn in his football gear. Today, he will get back home at 4 pm instead of 6:30 pm. This will make it a lot easier for him to get everything done before the next day. Extreme time management was a way of life last term -- come home, eat, take his shower and get his homework done and be ready to get up at 6 am the next morning.

Unfortunately, early home because of no football is like cutting off your head to lose a few pounds of weight. School with no football ....? where are the priorities there? : ). Something's wrong, somewhere. A new, quieter time will start. No tension about the upcoming game, but none of the expectant electricity either. Just school. Interesting to find out how that will be.

It will be happiness to see him walk into the door before dusk -- Kevin and the older kids had gotten into the habit of going down through the dark (COLD) forest to meet the late bus, and now Sean can head up by himself in the late (still cold) afternoon. But it will be a bit sorrowful, too, to know what is missing from the day for him.

Yesterday I gave Sean some dividers for his school binder and it he was quite pleased by this simple solution. He takes notes in class but then can't always find them when he needs them -- a couple of the teachers ask for them on occasion. Now he can put the relevant notes behind the proper color coded, labelled divider. He was happy about that. Football, for Sean, is enough to make it OK to have to go to school and get used to a significantly different way of learning.

Next week is Thanksgiving Break -- the high school kids get the whole week off, and Liam will be home. Sean is looking forward to that. We all are.

Homeschooling for us has always been most essentially about family. I wish I could find the Chesterton quote where he said that education was primarily about equipping the person to live in a family. He said it way better than that. I think part of it is that the education of the child also is a stage in the education of the parents. Someone said "Insanity is hereditary; you get it from your kids." I think learning is like that, too. Because learning is a matter of forming relationships, raising kids brings a whole new richness to relationships, to others and to the world.

This bleacher picture is titled by Aidan:
Bleachers with nobody on them... Nothing. Football has been a way to tie our family together even when Sean is gone 11 hours times 5 every week. Every Friday evening was about sitting on the bleachers cheering for our team, celebrating their highlights and agonizing with their difficulties. Now the rhythm of the week will change. It's sad to see a season drawing to an end, even when we know it will be replaced by a new season that will bring good things of its own.