There Won't Be Any Second Grade or Third or...

By Elena Matyas

Roxie should be starting 2nd grade tomorrow. She loved her kindergarten year. We were in awe of her development over her far too brief school experience.

We hit the elementary school jackpot with compassionate, dedicated, earnest and loving teachers and administrators, in a diverse and supportive school community. Roxie was forging lifelong friendships and was delighted to go off to a place where she was cared for and adored. We were finding our groove as school parents.

I treasured packing Roxie’s lunches with love notes, cherished walking her to school and arranged my work schedule so I could volunteer for “Fun Friday” afternoon activities.

When Roxie drowned, so did our lives as school parents. We long for such things and now suppress this void in our lives. Seeing Roxie’s friends grow and imagining the girl she would be is unbearably painful.

Amidst COVID quarantine, emotional withdrawal has been convenient. We have a perfectly legitimate excuse to avoid friends and any sort of social engagement. We slog along in this new arhythmical life, waking with the same ache in the pit of our stomachs day after day, wondering how we are going to make it through and when, if ever, we will be able to unravel the cloak of despair that surrounds us.

There’s no morning bell to organize our days, and no school calendar to structure our weeks. 

Although distance-learning helps to avert many sources of 1st day jitters, I’m sure there will still be trepidation at bedtime tonight for many boys and girls about to launch into another year of learning and growing.

I think about the gentle words of encouragement we would have offered Roxie when tucking her in. I would have packed her a lunch with a love note and a drawing of her favorite cartoon character, even if she would be eating her lunch at our kitchen table.