I Heard What You Said....

I can not believe that we are 2 weeks away from the end of the 2008-2009 school year. In summary, it was HELL. Man-child started off eager to finish the year and plan for high School. By October, the excitement was gone. I started my Mantra... "The grade you get now will have an impact on the high school you select. Keep your grades up". I must have said this everyday - did he listen - NO!!! In Thanksgiving, a student was killed at a school that is located next door to his school. Man-child shut down. He refused to do any school and refused to go to school for 4 days. Well... I began calling everyone, seeking help, counseling, therapy.. you name it, I took advantage of it. His response -"Just leave me ALONE". SIGH January brought a new attitude, but some spitefulness and I am still repeating my Mantra to him. By February, my brother and his family moved in (you'll have to revisit previous blogs from February) - OH BOY!!! Talk about DRAMA and FAMILY DRAMA at that.... I am still repeating my Mantra and seeking any type of help. By spring break, all of the top high school that he wanted to attend did not accept him because of his mediocre grades. DOUBLE SIGH At this point, I am praying 'cause I know now that somewhere I lost focused. PRAY ......PRAY.....PRAY

In the midst of all this drama, his principal calls me and says, "Man-child is extremely bright and I have to agree that maybe our school was not a challenge for him". I'm like -DUH!!!! He continued and stated that despite his grades, (and they were bad), Man-child scored in the top 5 percentile of all B'more city in the standardized test. He also qualified and passed with a score of 82% on the High School assessment test for Algebra I and English I. DUH again...

So, what does all of this mean? Man-child will be promoted to High School and it will be a school of my choice. He will also be place in an advance placement courses. When we sat down and went through everything that happened this year - his attitude, grades, etc. , he said "I heard what You said, I just wasn't listen"

When am I ever going to learn?!! Sigh

Annual Cleaning Of Man-Child's Room

This weekend, Man-child went camping with his scout troop. Hallelujah!!! We needed a break from each other. I made a list of all the things I wanted to do - movie, visit some friends, very LONG Bubble bath, sleep late, take a nap and go shopping. YEAH!!!! Needless to say, I didn't do any of them. I took the time to clean Man-child's room.

Mind you, before he left, he said he cleaned it. I've learned from past experience that my son is very creative in cleaning (remember the multiple sets of sheets on his bed) . I got all of my cleaning supplies and I was ready for combat.

Well, it wasn't as bad as I thought. On the upside, I found his remote to the t.v. (he has been looking for that for a month), his house keys ( I had another set made), his calculator, computer flash drive, wireless remote to the computer and the case for MY cellphone. On the downside, I found 8 plastic water bottles, 3 soda cans, 6 forks, 2 spoons, one green sandwich, 2 letters from his teacher (addressed to me from March that I am not going to follow up on), and three bath towels (well that's a good thing compared to last year when I found a dozen). So I am thinking, NOT BAD!! I also took the time to go through his closet and purged clothes that he could not wear or have not worn. I found at least 4 pair of pants with tags still on them and a few shirts. (Made of list of things to buy for the summer -- Uggggg )

All in all, I was exhausted but it felt good. After I thought about it ... this was a piece of cake compared to last year. When he came home, he just Thanked me for finding all the lost goods and returned to ignoring me. Prayerfully, there will be a day when I won't have to clean his room.

By the way, I did take an extra LONG Bubble Bath. :-)