When Do We Get To Relax?

For the first time in 14 years I will not be attending an Allen ISD meet the teacher night. I will not be anxious about my kid’s first day and I will not be standing in line at Office Depot on that first night. Instead I will stress over my kids driving to Lubbock and I will be hoping they checked the oil along the way.

With our daughter heading to Texas Tech for the first time and our son returning to Lubbock, the Carroll’s have entered new territory. Parents of college-age kids are now nodding their heads in agreement. I am no longer stressed about the teachers or the locker combination. I’m too busy stressing over things that are completely out of my control.

As Allen ISD’s public information director, I often speak with parents who are concerned about their children and school. How will my child find her way to class? Should I join them in the cafeteria on the first day? Do you have reserved parking spaces for kids at the high school (a favorite of mine)?
Every question is a good one because it’s our job as parents to be a little stressed and watch out for our own kids. Speaking with parents about school is easier now that my wife Ann and I have run the gamut from kindergarten to graduation. It’s not that simple with college.

The problem with sending kids to college out of town is that there is no one to call. I considered calling the Texas Tech public information office to see if the dorm room is carpeted but it just seemed a little trivial. Maybe I should ask if they have reserved parking spaces on campus for my kids – that would get a good laugh.

We dutifully purchased how to succeed in college books for each of the kids in the hopes that they would be better prepared. I doubt that either kid read them. In fact, my daughter packed her “how to” book this week admitting she hadn’t seen it since Christmas.

As parents we may not be ready but the kids are. Their advice book is now called Facebook and they are both better prepared to face college than I ever was both academically and socially.
Part of the credit must go to the Allen schools and a lot of great teachers. Along the way they pushed and challenged my kids in ways that no nagging parent could. Just watch a lazy ninth grader pop out of bed at 6:15 am for band practice and you see things more clearly.

When my kids were in fourth grade I worried about them being bullied for lunch money in middle school. It never happened. When they were in eighth grade I had a hard time imagining them succeeding in that big high school but they did. When they were in tenth grade I couldn’t imagine their rooms ever being clean again and they weren’t – at least until they left for college.

I asked a more experienced friend “when will I stop worrying about the kids and just relax?”
“Relax?,” he said. “Wait till they come home again looking for a job. Wait till you have planned a wedding. Wait till you’re expecting to be a grandparent. Should I continue?”

I think I’ll drop an email to that Texas Tech public information guy in the morning.