Our First Parent-Teacher Conference

This happened a couple of weeks ago....

Mike and I went to our very first parent teacher conference.  Our little blond haired, blue-eyed, first-born seems to be growing up no matter how much Mike (& on occasion me too) wishes she wasn't. I was sitting in Vi's classroom in the tiny Pre-K plastic chair thinking----really, really, I am the Mother of a 5 year old? Preposterous! Impossible! I am still 24 (in my brain), unorganized, irresponsible, & way to unsure of myself to be the primary caretaker of said child.  Then as the teacher started to talk about what a delight MY daughter was to have in class and how she is well-liked, a good listener and takes direction.  I couldn't help my huge toothy smile. Then she said the best phrase she could have uttered in our short 20 minute meeting, "Violet likes to learn and because of  that she will do really well in school."  I could feel the lump in my throat & choked it back. It felt as if all my (Mother's) guilt  about all the things I feel I do wrong suddenly seemed to lift of my shoulders if only for a moment.  It sounds silly, but validation for being a "good" parent doesn't happen too often so when it does I want to bask in it a little.  I have the constant running dialogue in my head about what I could do better.... Why did I just say that? Did I just scar her for life?  What would so & so do?  What did that book say to do? It never ends.  Here was my opportunity to turn my internal dialogue into, I did say that, I did gain knowledge from parenting books, I have an effect on her in a positive way!  Woo-Hoo!
Mike and I high-fived on our way down the hall-way out of the school.  We picked up Violet from his parent's house after sharing the exciting news we must be doing something right some of the time and got back to our daily life, sigh.