First day of nursery
It was Noyonika’s first day of nursery yesterday. I felt a tinge of sadness as we dropped her off at school. There were a few new kids bawling. Nika stood to the side of the room, looking about, wondering who these kids were, why they were crying and why she couldn’t see her old teachers. She looked a little lost, and looked a little grown up.
My first day at school isn’t anything to be proud of. I still remember parts of it, though it might have been embellished in memory by Mamma telling the story multiple times to me. Mamma came to school to drop me off, and I howled, bawled, cried and wailed (I used to be a big crier!).
I remember being at the park in school, and there being (in my memory) a hill nearby – but thinking about it, it probably was the sports area in school, for which there was a set of steps leading downward, and next to it was just a untarred, sloping area of earth.
Mamma dropped me off with the teacher (was it Mrs. Fernandes?), and the teacher walked me down the steps, while I howled “tipple thee one zero” – 33310 – our home phone number. We finally got down to the sports area, and I remember feeling a pang of loss. My crying finally subsided, and as I looked about, I caught a glimpse of Mamma, standing at the top of the “hill”.
That did it – I spied my route to escape, and threw all caution to the wind and ran up the hill, while the teacher possibly was hot in pursuit! I don’t remember getting to Mamma, but I know I did. I went home early that day, since I couldn’t possibly be consoled to go back to school!
Memories of that day came back seeing Nika go to nursery, and I felt a tug at my heart saying “She is a baby, why are you sending her into the big, bad world?”
