Field Trip to the Zoo

One thing that I remember most about my school years, was my mother's active participation in our education. We all learned to put an emphasis on education -- through the attitude and example of mom, and dad. Mother was always active in the PTA, fund raising projects, science projects, extra-curricular activities, and any events that required chaperons. I don't have many memories of specific events of my parents being involved, but I do remember vividly mom's active participation in all aspects of our education. I frequently feel that me, and my siblings had fewer problems than a lot of kids, due to the amount of involvement that my parents had in each of our lives.

Parent teacher conferences were particularly unbearable, because it wasn't merely my mother that always attended. I can remember my father always coming home from work, in order to go to parent teacher conferences, with mom. I never looked forward to these evenings -- usually because I knew what the teacher was going to say. "Lisa is a great student, but she needs to work on not talking so much in class." I think by the end of my high school years, my parents could recite this phrase to the teachers, even before they started to think about uttering it. This of course would lead to the inevitable lecture on the importance of studying harder, and focusing on my schooling, and not goofing around so much in class. I don't think I ever thanked my parents for their avid care, and concern they demonstrated in my educational pursuits. But now, as an adult, I can see that it is one of the most important gifts they could ever have given to me in my life.

One particular annual event stands out from all the rest in my schooling years. When I was in elementary school, during the first week of December, mom would always take to the kitchen, and make gingerbread houses. These houses weren't just your usual gingerbread house, made out of graham crackers, with a couple of M & M's on them. These were considered a celebration for not only Christmas, but for Bob's birthday, as well. And mom, true to form, always had to share with the whole class. And of course she couldn't single out one child over another. So, she made a gingerbread house for each child, for every single year of our Elementary school years. These houses were spectacular. I can still smell the warm gingerbread as it came out of the ove. The gingerbread was home made, and it would take hours to get them put together, with the frosting. Once they were completed, we were allowed to help with the decorating. I am sure you could never taste the gingerbread of the house, because of all the candy that was on them. They were big enough, to feed an entire elementary school class. Which is exactly what she had in mind, when she put them together. On the last day, before Christmas break, were were suppose to get together as a class, and break the gingerbread house, to share with all of our class mates. I can still remember the debates that mom had with more than one teacher, who didn't want to break the house, because they were so beautiful. They just didn't understand that in mom's eyes -- they were a gift for the kids of our classes, and they were suppose to be broken, and shared.

One picture I came across, brought back a lot of memories of my mother's involvement in my schooling. It is a picture of a small group of me, Bob, and three other of my class mates during a field trip to the zoo; mom was helping out with this trip, and the picture was attached to a thank you card. Attached to the back of a construction paper bird/card, it had a brief note written by our teacher. "Thank you for helping us on our field trip, love" From there each one of us were to sign the card, in our interesting rendition of handwriting, from the time. Myself, Bobby (Bob), Rachel, Mardee, and Lori.

My school years would never have been the same, if mom had been less involved in our lives, and participated in fewer events. I had forgotten how much I treasured the time I was able to spend with her, and the effort she put into always building a relationship with each of her children.