Bye Bye, Bob and Larry

It happens to all parents; kids go through stages, and passages of life. In our house we recently boxed up all the Veggie Tales videos and gave them away, along with the stuffed animals of the characters, including Bob the Tomato and Larry the Cucumber (the civilian identity of caped crime fighter Larry Boy). I’ve spent years in the company of Bob and Larry, and their friends, Junior Asparagus, Madame Blueberry (my personal favorite), and the French peas. The writers were clever enough to include cultural allusions the parents might get. The French peas’ parody of the Monty Python French castle guards was great, and I melted at the sight of the U.S.S. Apple Pies, complete with Scottish engineer.

But all things come to an end, and so our house is now Veggie Tale free. School is starting and everyone (especially Mom) is a year older. The supplies are bought, the backpacks packed, the clothes laid out and the lunches planned. On the first day of school the playground was full of assorted parents bravely smiling but inwardly wailing “My baby!” in an almost palpable way, as if our offspring were being shackled and led off to the mines instead of walking in a orderly line into an air conditioned suburban school. The little Janes are always excited and eager. I vomit and break out in a rash. The clump of hair that fell out and left a small bald spot (not noticeable but still somewhat worrisome) is new this year. Who knows, maybe it’s ringworm.

In part all this anxiety is because the school is like a fortress and the doors clang shut with my children inside. If you think politics is machiavellian, you’ve never dealt with a school system. I’ve had more individual face time with my state rep than with the principal of my kid’s school. Think maneuvering through party politics is tricky? Try the PTA (I know most of them aren’t called that anymore, but it’s what I grew up with.) I have an easier time getting a call back from my federal Congressional representative’s office than the head of the school board. It’s harder to get into the school district’s administrative offices than my safe deposit box. I’ve stood closer to Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Arlen Specter than I have any three members of the school board. You get the idea.

Update: the kids, as you might have expected, are fine. The rash hasn’t gone away yet, but I’m hopeful. My hair is starting to grow back. The letters announcing who made the cut to be room parent have gone out but nothing has shown up in my mailbox yet, so I fear that I fell short here, as in so many other areas. [sigh]