Full Circle

This week, both of my kids are spending their mornings at cooking camp offered by a local cooking school. It’s actually the second time this summer that my daughter has been at the camp. She did a week early in the summer and loved it so much she asked to do another week.

Toward the end of that first week, my son was with me when I dropped his sister off. Normally he opts to stay in the car when I walk her in someplace, but on this particular morning he got out of the car and said he wanted to see what the school looked like on the inside. When we walked into the school, the “head chef” of the camp greeted us and engaged my son in a conversation. She asked why he wasn’t at camp with his sister, talked to him about his favorite foods, and encouraged him to think about joining the camp another time. I remember thinking how nice it was to see him interacting with a new-to-him person in a new-to-him place, but didn’t think the conversation would have a lasting impact.

I was wrong.

Later that day, I was on the cooking school website trying to figure out if there was another week ,with spots available in camp, that would work for my daughter. When I mentioned to my daughter that I found another week she could attend, my son quickly chimed in and asked if he could attend the camp as well.  I was surprised and must have asked him half a dozen times if he truly was serious. He was. “The teacher was really nice. I think it will be fun,” he said.

Fast forward about a month to this past Monday. As we pulled into the parking lot of the cooking school, my daughter asked my son if he was excited. He responded by asking if the teacher would be the same, “Because I really liked her.” I told him that as far as I knew, the teacher would be the same.

I was wrong.

We walked into the school, and as I was signing the kids in, we were greeted by a “head chef” who was not the woman my son had found to be so nice. I looked around and did not see the chef from earlier in the summer. I looked at my son and saw panic in his eyes. As I decided how to respond – or not – to the unasked questions I saw on his face, my daughter took control.

“Come with me,” she said to him, “Let’s get our aprons and find a spot at the table.” So he did. Aprons on, they went to the table and looked for their assigned spots. I watched from a distance as fresh panic appeared on my son’s face when he realized that his assigned spot was several kids away from his sister’s assigned spot. I watched as my daughter took my son’s hand, looked him in the eye and told him, “Don’t worry. We’ll get it changed.”

I approached the new teacher, and asked if it would be possible to have my kids next to each other. She responded that they had found it was better to have siblings separated. I told her that in general, I could see how that would be the case, but in this specific case – in the case of my son who is an Aspie and struggles with anxiety and panic – it would be best for everybody for my kids to be next to one another. I watched as the expression on the teacher’s face morphed from one of a person in charge explaining something to a meddling parent, to one of a person in charge who suddenly had dozens of questions about one of the kids in her care (but that is not the point of the story).

About that time, my daughter came over to join us. She said, “He needs me. I need to be able to help him if he gets upset.” With not another question, the teacher rearranged the seats so that my kids were together.

As I drove away that morning, I remembered another first day drop off at another camp several years ago. The first summer both kids were old enough to attend morning camps for preschoolers at our YMCA (they would have been 3 and 4 years old that summer), I registered them both for two consecutive weeks. The first week the drop off went smoothly – they were excited to be doing something together and the YMCA was familiar to them both. The second week, the drop off was rough. The counselors from the first week, were not the same as the counselors on the second week. My daughter had developed an adoring attachment to one of the counselors from the first week, and when she discovered that person was not there on the second week she melted down in a way that only disappointed 3 year olds can melt down. She was inconsolable. She was never a kid who clung to my legs at drop offs, but that morning she clung to both of my legs as she sobbed and asked to leave.

That morning so many years ago, it was my son who held out his hand and said to my daughter “Don’t worry. I’m here. We can be together.” And I watched the fear disappear from her little face as she took his hand. Just like on the morning this week when I watched the fear disappear from his face as he realized she was by his side.

Full circle.

And as I have been writing this post, I have had flashing through my mind a slideshow of images over the years like this one…

They may not always agree, and they certainly do not always get along. But they always take care of each other….through the real, raw, broken and beautiful parts of life.