My son is all of two and a half years and he is going to school. And we are terrified. Till now he was ours and ours only. We knew what he was upto 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. If he so much as scratches a leg we are there to comfort him and tell him ‘coochi coo, don’t scratch dear it will hurt’. Now for 3 hours everyday he is out of our sight. We don’t know what he’s doing and its killing me and my wife. To top it all, parents aren’t allowed into the school either. What's wrong with parents being in the same class as their kid we ask and the headmistress looks at us with that "you are not the only parents with kids’ look and we get the message. Nonetheless we tried to sneak in one day but our boy started crying his head off when he saw us and we were quickly shooed away.

 

Its been a bit emotional too. The other day we put him in the school van and followed at a respectable distance. The van driver dropped him off at the school gates with his bag on his shoulder and water bottle round his neck. My son who is usually so exuberant and laughs and cries with equal vigour had his eye to the floor but was walking to the school. Half way in his bag fell off. Now at home he wouldn’t care less if he dropped something (normally he’s the one who throws it away anyway). Usually there’s this high pitched squeak - mummy, glass keela viinthu (mommy glass has fallen down) or thani chinthi mamma, thodchu (water has spilt mom, clean). But not today. He stopped, looked around helplessly for a few seconds, bent down, picked up the bag and put it over his shoulders. My wife was like ready to run and help him but satisfied herself by shedding copious silent tears instead. I wasn’t much better off myself.

 

Yesterday my wife went to pick him up and he had all the tell tale signs of having cried all day. When we asked him, he said ‘teacher azha mamma’ (teacher made me cry mummy). My wife stomped off to the teacher. She said apparently they had been trying to teach the two and half year old kid to draw and say standing and sleeping lines. My son as usual said no. And she had scolded him. My wife asked what the heck they were teaching him that for at this tender teeny weeny age. Fortunately the teacher was able to explain very patiently the logic behind this heinous act or she would have had to face the wrath of a furious mother who son’s liberty had been grossly violated.

Something tells us that we have to let go. After all in a few years he’s going to grow older have more friends with whom he’ll want to spend more time than he does with us (God forbid when that time comes), even a girlfriend or two (my wife has promised to give those expectant girlfriends hell when the try), off to college, maybe even hostel (an involuntary shudder courses through my body when I even think of such a thing) and then get married (my wife‘s lips are drawn into a thin line like Harry Potters house head, Mcgonagall’s when I inadvertently mention this to her). Still he our son, and irrespective of what he does or where he is he always will be. Letting go is hard. Maybe we’ll wait for a few years before we try again.