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My son’s third-grade year is suddenly and inexorably drawing to a close. And what a year it’s been: the first year he’s received letter grades, the year he’s learned how to write in cursive, the year he’s completed his first research project. It’s an important year, the third-grade year. A transition year, I think. There is no way I could ever have imagined Ben doing what he will be doing in a couple of days: taking his first field trip to a city two hours away. He’ll get on a bus at 6:30am, and he won’t be home until after 7pm. Although the idea of it has me biting my nails, the reality is that he’s perfectly capable of comporting himself appropriately on this trip. He knows what to do if he should get separated from his group. Would he have been ready to go on this kind of trip a year ago? Absolutely not.

This year has also been a transition year for Ben outside of school. He’s learned to handle having a retainer. (By ‘handle’ I mean that he has learned not to break it and not to lose it. This knowledge counts for a lot, perhaps more than a hundred dollars.) He recently acquired glasses and instinctively understands their utility. Seeing the blackboard, it turns out, is not overrated. He started tae kwon do in January at his father’s urging. I was hesitant. I chafed at the fighting; that it is fighting in self-defense barely moved me. But as it turns out, tae kwon do has been instrumental in helping Ben corral his lanky body. Thanks to tae kwon do, he has a much better kinesthetic sense, he has more patience, and he is more disciplined.

Ben has also had more than one growth spurt this year, the change in his height merely reflecting his intellectual and emotional growth. He’s now only a head shorter than I am. His shoe size was just measured as a 5, which is the equivalent of a woman’s size 6. I watch him as he goes off to school, and, as he recedes from my sight, I do a double-take. Who is that boy? He cannot possibly be mine. My boy is smaller, more fragile, less confident in his stride. My boy has smaller shoes.

I would never have believed that there could be so much change in a child, any child, in one year. But there’s too much evidence to the contrary for me to maintain that belief. Now I know. Now I understand that fourth grade will bring as many changes, if not more, in my firstborn. I am no longer naïve. This year Ben received an education. I did, too. I learned that my son can face challenges, can rise to them, can grow from them. And that he can do all that in large part without me.

It feels as if, after years of pushing the back of Ben’s bicycle to steady him and to help him gain speed, I finally let go in this, his third-grade year. And instead of falling, he just continued on, pedaling firmly and confidently until he crested the hill down the street. And now I cannot see him anymore. But still I am certain that he’s just fine. Better than fine. He’s soaring.

Has your child’s third-grade year been magical?

[tags]parenting, kids, third grade, older, mature, growth, wistful, memories, future[/tags]
Photo graciously provided by Oliver Lavery, through a Creative Commons license, some rights reserved