The Vigil of the First Day of School

I have never met a first day of school that did not make me cry.

I have been both a lover of routine and allergic to the unknown since childhood. As I got older, the tears lessened but each year, without fail, they came. Sometimes they came from exhaustion once I got home. Sometimes they were choked back at a desk where I was sure I was about to begin the class that would reveal once and for all that I was, in fact, an imposter. My senior year of high school, tears welled up because I realized that this was my last first day of school before I launched. And while not everyone processes through their eyeballs like I do, there is no doubt that no matter how you move through this world, the first day of school is A LOT.

A decade ago, my oldest child began kindergarten. I felt the knot in my throat and the pit in my stomach arrive weeks before the actual first day. I realized that the grown-up side of the first day of school is different but no less weighty. That year we happened to be finishing up a deck, and her dad and I both took the day off work. For that entire day, while she was learning names and how to line up for the cafeteria, I was attaching deck boards to joists. With each screw, I lifted up another concern to God the parent, God the child, God the good that lives in all people…

Please let someone play with her during recess.
Please let her be able to open those pre-packaged crackers.
Please let her be brave and raise her hand if she needs to go to the bathroom.
Please let school be a safe place for her.
Please, please, please. 

Hundreds of screws and hundreds of thoughts released to God. One of the hardest things to accept, I’ve found, is that God loves my children more than I do. It’s both mind-bending and humbling. So, I held vigil for my girl with God until she came home that day. I laid out all my wild worries and hopes for God and me to look at together, knowing there would be no answers, but there would be a peace that comes when we bring things into the light. 

And this has been my first day of school tradition since that first day of kindergarten; I hold vigil. Some years feel lighter, some heavier, but there is something about setting apart this one day to direct my thoughts, my heart, and my mind on my children doing a big, brave thing that gives me some peace as we prepare for and recover from the beginning of the school year. It allows me to be the parent I hope to be on the first day of school—excited, supportive, and joyful—while I live into the reality of my own anxiety and worry.

This year, my youngest began middle school and my oldest began high school. We are heavy on the transitions, and as I navigated the last few weeks of summer and dodged and diffused the manifestations of that in my two pubescent humans, I looked forward to my vigil. I became hungry for it. I did all I could to be a source of calm and reassurance as we moved towards the first day, and when they both got to where they needed to go, I leaned in. 

I ruminated over the ways this year would challenge my children. I pulled it all out to show God the parent, God the child, God the good that lives in all people…

Please let them choose kind over popular.
Please let them be their best selves; honest and funny.
Please let them eat something with protein in it during the day.
Please let them remember who they are.
Please let them be seen and known and belong.
Please let them look for the students who need to be included and do the including. 

Please, please, please.

This vigil is not some magic I believe will make all these things happen, but it is a dedicated time for me to work out my own anxieties, hopes, and fears with the One who cares just as much as I do. 

This first day of school, what do you need to hold with God the parent, God the child, God the good that lives in all people?