Friday, February 2, 2018

A potential career

I know it's early to begin thinking about aptitude or potential careers for the boys, but one potential career path has to come light recently.

I am totally mortified and upset by this, but yesterday, Stokes CUT his teacher's hair at preschool. With actual scissors. Yes, you read that right. I am at a loss.

Normally if something crazy happens at school, we will get a note on the school app or when I go in to pick them up, a teacher or an administrator will talk to me about the event/action/whatever the case may be. Yesterday, none of that happened. I went to pick up the boys after having worked a little bit late, and they were gathered watching a movie in a room that is not their regular room and their teachers had left for the day. The sweet lady at the front desk, Darlene, didn't mention anything, so I go pick them up, as I would any other day, noted that both Stokes and William were good on their behavior chart for the day, and we came home. Later on, during dinner, Stokes casually mentioned that he cut Miss Bailey's hair. I was not sure what to think. I asked him if he was telling a tale and he said he wasn't. He said that all the teachers got really upset with him and he had to sit on a blue chair for a while. He also said that the director of the school and another administrator talked to him. I asked William to confirm whether this was true or not and he confirmed what Stokes was saying. I honestly wasn't sure if this was an elaborate story...simply because there was no indication of anything like that when I picked him up. I just told him that we would have to find out in the morning what had happened. Overnight I kept thinking about it and worrying about the aftermath, if it was indeed true.

This morning, I woke up still thinking about it. While I was in the shower, a thought came to me. I suddenly remembered something that was said when I picked the boys up. The teacher that was watching the kids in the room with the movie casually said, "looks like he's trying out a new career". I was puzzled. I had just walked in to them watching a movie and had NO IDEA what she was talking about. In the chaos that is picking up the boys, I just kind of responded, "What? A professional movie watcher?" I literally did not have a clue what she meant and meanwhile, I was trying to encourage the boys to get ready to go home, get jackets on, stop watching the movie and start walking, etc. The teacher didn't really respond to my puzzled question or correct me, so I brushed it off and forgot about it. But in hindsight, after Stokes told me what he'd done, and I'd had time to mull it over, this little nugget of a conversation came back to me. With a pit in my stomach, I went to find Thomas and told him that I thought Stokes was probably telling the truth and also about what the teacher had said the night before.

On the way to school, I was so nervous. I was concerned that his teacher, who has pretty long hair, would be there with a very short haircut, that was necessary after her student haircut. I was trying to think out and plan what I would say, if it was true. When we got there, she looked normal and was smiling and laughing and joking...but as it turns out, it was true. All of my emotions came out that had been bottled up since last night's dinner, and I got teary while talking to her, talking to the director and talking to Darlene at the front. Miss Bailey is totally fine, which is a huge relief, and she commented that she already had a hair appointment scheduled for Monday anyway, and that she and her hair dresser have had a laugh about it already. The school director brushed it off as well and I got a big hug and a pep talk from Darlene. I'm planning to pay for Miss Bailey's haircut, and although she wouldn't tell me where she goes, I have Darlene looking in to it for me so that we can try to make it right.

The background is that all the kids play hairdresser with the teachers every day. That is not unusual. They will "pretend" cut, curl and brush their hair on a regular basis. This was all happening, but Stokes went and got some real scissors and actually cut the hair. Apparently, he was shocked and wasn't sure what to think when reality came crashing down that it was permanent. It was probably an inch or so of hair and wasn't immediately noticeable when talking to Miss Bailey this morning. Miss Bailey even had her hair down and said that she would be wearing it in a ponytail if it was bad. I also found out that the school has some sort of scissors that only cut paper, nothing else, and the kids are used to those, but these (unfortunately) weren't that type. All real scissors are going to be in locked drawers from now on, thanks to this incident. Everyone reassured me that it was a mistake, and not a big deal, and tried to make me feel better. They said that I will look back on this and laugh....which I'm sure I will...but right now I'm still upset. It could have been so much worse and no one would be laughing if he had cut it really short.

Thank goodness that it really wasn't worse than it was and that everyone, Miss Bailey especially, handled it with such grace. I will definitely feel better once we do something nice for her, and we're going to have some stern discussions about scissors and hair at our house.

picture from today

I had to blog about it because I want to look back at this years from now, or maybe when Stokes is a hairdresser to the celebs, to remember it and to laugh.

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