Midnight Flight

Monday morning, our new shed was delivered.  This house does not have a garage, so we had a junky carport and a junky laundry room. Now both have been cleaned up a bit.  The delivery driver had a remote control for the trailer it was on, and he could move the shed in all directions.  It was pretty neat to watch.  It is always fun to watch delivery drivers navigate up our driveway.  Always an impressive feat.  

Monday evening was Back to School night.  We were supposed to have pizza and games and bouncy houses, but the weather was not cooperating, so it was reduced down to Meet the Teacher.  I had a very full classroom of 9 boys and their parents.  The majority of us were sweating, but it was good to let them see the room.  Caroline and Josiah went to 'meet' their teachers, which really meant they went to find their lockers and chat with their friends.  Henry opted out of the evening.  Meeting them last year was good enough for him.  

As the kids got their backpacks ready for the first day, we had a lively discussion on what color spiral notebook goes with which subject.  I put in my two cents and told them the correct color assignments: Math is blue, because blue is the best color and math is the best subject;  History is red (lots of blood throughout history); Science is green (living things);  English is yellow, because I was not a fan of either in my younger years.  There is no deviation from this standard.

Backpacks were ready, lunch bags were out.  We thought we were all set.  I casually asked Josiah, "Hey, do you have a brown belt for tomorrow?"  Nope.  So, at 8:00 p.m., Todd and Josiah were at Walmart buying a brown belt for his uniform.  

There was less excitement this year than last.  Less enthusiasm.  However, they do like their teachers.  Caroline thinks science will be her favorite subject.  The science teacher really is an amazing man.  All the kids at the school just love him.  She is also taking geography this year, which she was not excited about at all.  Nevertheless, she's been drawing and labeling maps on her own all weekend.  They learn the states of the U.S. first before moving on to the countries of the world, but Caroline just taught herself South America.  

The boys liked the new Latin teacher a lot.  I met him during the in-services and knew he was going to be one the kids enjoyed.  Josiah had a bit of correspondence going with him before school even began.  Mr. Evans was most likely trying out the new grading software and Josiah received notifications that he was given two grades: 100 & 44.  Josiah sent him an email inquiring about the failing grade.  That first day, they were told they could only speak Latin in class, with points deducted for any English.  To help them out, he has a number of phrases at the front of the classroom for them to use.  Josiah already used, "I'm confused."  This Latin is less of a grammatical lesson.  Their textbook is more literature style - one long story about a Roman family.  

Their Latin teacher is also a marathon runner and we saw him at the Midnight Flight on Friday evening.  When he ran passed by us, Josiah yelled, "Optimae!"  It was dark, but I saw the side of his lips curl up into a smile before he was off to the finish line.  He may also have smiled because that's the feminine version of the word...

We enjoyed Chinese takeout that first day of school.  That was my request.  Good food.  No cooking.  

On Friday morning, the school had their Convocation.  During that time, they inducted the new students into different houses.  They started by announcing the leadership team for each house.  And that's when Henry went forward because he was asked to be the Shepherd for Rountree House.  The Shepherd is the Hype Man, so basically Henry needs bandanas and green paint and a lot of energy.  It was a big deal to be asked, so that was special for him.

We closed out our school week with the Midnight Flight.  This is an annual race down the streets of Anderson.  Henry's cross country team was running the 5k.  Josiah decided at the last minute to run the mile.  It absolutely stormed that evening before the races began.  Josiah's started at 8:15 p.m.  Once his race started, the crowd meandered towards the finish line.  We hadn't even reached it before the officials were yelling, "Off the course!"  We looked and the first runner was coming around to the finish line.  He's a local legend and we were told he tried out for the Olympics.  He finished the mile in 4:18.  This man ran the 5k later on and won that as well. Josiah did well.  He made it in 10:35.  The cross country team spotted him and cheered him on towards the end.  

The 5k was set to begin at 9p.m., but it started to rain very close to that time.  The runners were already lined up when they announced they would be doing the fireworks before the race so they did not get ruined.  It felt like they were setting those fireworks off as quickly as possible.  As soon as they ended, we heard a deep rumble and then lightning struck in a long horizontal line with one vertical line right in the path of the race course.  Any other sporting event would have cancelled, but the announcer said, "On the siren sound, begin."  They were off.  It rained pretty hard their entire race.  

And so begins our first full week of school.