I finished The Supremes at Earl’s All-You-Can-Eat, and I continued to like it. I would recommend it. But considering how many times someone else has recommended a book, and I’ve gotten the book and within one page (“DEAR GOD, WHAT IS THIS FRESH HELL?”) have wondered how two people can be so different and still like each other, I will not be at all hurt and confused if you don’t like it. I’d say give it a chapter or two, but not much more: it was by the end of the first chapter that I thought it was wonderful.
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I emailed the Girl Scouts just to make sure I was right that if a camp session no longer showed up as available, that meant it was full: I was worried that I was going through all this stress and then it would turn out I’d just misunderstood. And I got such a helpful email in return, it nearly brought tears to my eyes. Many of the other emails I’ve sent to summer activities asking for more information have made it WORSE (Me: “Will you be posting the 2013 information soon?” Them: “It’s already on there!” Me: “…”), but this one not only answered my question but volunteered information that was ADDITIONALLY HELPFUL. And the happy thing is that it’s not that the camp session was full, it’s that only two girls had signed up for it so they had to cancel it. So I didn’t mess it up: if I HAD signed up for it months ago, it still would have been canceled, and meanwhile Elizabeth would have had months of thinking she was going to her first choice, followed by finding out she wasn’t. So! That is nice!
AND, the person who emailed said they were combining the camp Elizabeth wanted with two others that she also liked the sound of! It’s for grades 2-5, but I had my mind changed completely on that issue by Amanda‘s comment that a going-into-middle-school Girl Scout is likely to be a different sort than the middle school girls I’m imagining. (A new source of stress has stepped into the gap, because the camp is listed as only grades 4-5, even though the person I’m emailed with is assuring me it will be grades 2-5. But let’s not dwell on it! Let’s assume everything will be fine!)
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I’d decided NOT to break the school rule and send a treat in with the twins for their birthday. But after FOUR MORE CHILDREN in their classes brought in cupcakes for their birthdays, the twins were distraught about it rather than calm and accepting, and I was getting distraught as well. I couldn’t think of ANY WAY to contact the teachers about it, though, without sounding accusatory: “Since you’re letting OTHER children break the rule, I PRESUME it’s okay for MY children to break it TOO.” And I definitely didn’t want to give the children the “If everyone else it breaking a rule, it’s okay for you to break it” idea. And I didn’t want to put the teacher in an awkward situation. And I didn’t want to just show up with the treats. I felt stuck. I needed to ask what the situation was, but how to ask it in a way that shows I didn’t LIE when I signed the form saying I’d thoroughly read and understood the handbook, and that shows I would never be asking to have the rule broken for me if I hadn’t had evidence that the rule wasn’t being used—and that shows I wouldn’t be at all upset if the rule WERE enforced?
What I did was, I gave up. There was no way to communicate that I knew the rule AND not sound either accusatory or as if I were asking for special permission to break a rule (which might make the teacher feel forced to say no: she might feel she can let it pass if someone just brings in the cupcakes, but can’t explicitly say “Yes, I give permission for you to break the rule”). So this is what I wrote to each teacher: “Dear Mrs. _____, Child’s Name wanted me to ask if it would be all right for her/him to bring in a birthday treat on Tuesday for the class. –Swistle Thistle.” My hope was that this format allowed the teacher to comfortably say either yes or no, and that by putting the question in the child’s mouth I was avoiding completely the issue of whether I knew about the rule or not. Both teachers replied that of COURSE it was fine for them to bring in a birthday treat. I am trying to be happy (yay, I managed the email! yay, the twins are happy! yay, I found a way to handle the situation!) rather than annoyed (WHY DO WE HAVE THIS UNENFORCED RULE THAT MAKES LIFE DIFFICULT AND UNHAPPY?).
That was a brilliant solution, but I agree the original situation is vexing.
About camps, do you find there’s inconsistency when a grade level is specified about whether they mean the child’s current grade or next year’s grade? Here it’s almost always the child’s next grade so I accidently signed June up for a 2nd-5th grade robot camp (she’s in first) and then found out later it meant for kids currently in 2nd to 5th. I was so annoyed, esp. since this group’s online registration system is a nightmare already.
It makes me CRAZY that all the naughty parents have made it okay to break the rule. Rrrrr! But good for you, for finding a way to manage it. I hope the teacher thought, “Wow, Mrs. Thistle is so much more gracious/polite/socially evolved than all those rule-breakers!” ;)
I wonder if the rule is school-wide but each teacher can take their own stance on it. My oldest’s K teacher had a no party/no treats rule but his 1st grade teacher had more of an “any excuse to party” rule. Still, it would have been nice if they were very CLEAR on this.
I’m glad you got the birthday treat thing straightened out, although I think it would STILL greatly annoy me that there is an unenforced rule. The rage I feel at preschool pick-up/drop-off when parents don’t obey the very clear, very simple car line rules borders on homicidal some days. Apparently I really like rules.
FWIW, I have friends who are girl scout leaders and they are ALL SUPER DUPER EXTRA WOW HELPFUL and love to get girls involved in girl scouts stuff if at all possible. It sounds like the ones you’re communicating with are the same. So you can probably relax a bit and count on the adults involved to be really inclusive and caring about all the kids and get everyone working together and having fun. I mean, if you can relax. I know MY brain likes to spin all kinds of WHAT-IFs and be a huge jerk over the most innocuous stuff. THANKS BRAIN. But, in my experience, girl scout leaders are amazeballs.
It sounds like one of those situations where the person who made up the rule does not have to deal with the daily consequences of the rule.
I am very glad to hear that the camp situation has… improved. I am hopeful that you will find the exact right camp experience for Elizabeth (and for you) and I bet she has a BLAST.
The school dessert rule thing makes me cross-eyed with annoyance. Why even HAVE the rule, then? WHY? You handled it perfectly and I’m so glad that it worked out for everyone involved. (Except, possibly, for the [invisible?] rule SETTER, who must be frantic with all the desserts showing up.)
I read The Supremes at Earl’s… (on your suggestion) and I LOVED IT! Thank you for posting book suggestions. I love that you post the things that might be upsetting so I know if the book will be ok for me. It’s because of you that I am able to read fiction again after a section of life involving PPD where everything I read was very upsetting, so I just stopped and went to all nonfiction books (ho hum after a while). I appreciate your suggestions so much. I’ve read the Cazalet books and Everything Matters! on your suggestion as well, and A Far Cry From Kensington, and I have enjoyed them all. Thank you thank you!