Ding-A-Ling

If you could know EXACTLY what your child's mark was in all of his classes, accurate to within one assignment/quiz/test grade on any given day, would you want to know?

I'm betting most of you are shaking your heads "YES!"  In fact, I'm betting most of you are wondering what I'm up to, keeping such information under wraps and only bringing it to your attention when my eldest child has clearly been in school many years.  Further, I'm betting you are now semi-jealous of the fact that I can tell you exactly what my child's grades are in each and every one of his seven classes, including assignments he completed TODAY.

I.HATE.IT.

See, every time one of those lovely assignments is posted to its website home, the website recognizes the grade and if it is below a 70%, I get an email.  My Smartphone, in response to the incoming email, dings me.  And this, fine ladies and gentlemen, has resulted in a tic that looks a lot like someone shooting across the room after the timer goes off to check the little urine/pregnancy stick and determine if it shows one or two lines.  Because, after all, the result could only mean the difference between the rest of my life being wonderfully-terrifical or horrendously-suckifical.

Except, that ding never means anything fantastic.  It means my child has failed.  Again.

And, I'm not the only Mom dealing with this angst.  Apparently a LOT of newly-minted seventh grade Moms are having this same issue, one being dinged so frequently that she figured out how to turn the noise on her phone completely OFF, just to avoid her son's grades sending her to the looney bin.

Truthfully, I wish to be back in the times of blind ignorance waiting until a) my child showed me his paperwork and apologized profusely b) the teacher sent a "friendly" email and I sent back a thesis detailing why I don't suck as my child's homework helper or c) report cards came out at the end of a grading period and we could rest easy, knowing there was a long break in time before we had to "do" school again.

But, I don't have a choice.  We are stuck with the beast.  And, I am having to tame myself from watching it like a child watches his first pot that is working toward a boil.

I have to put down the Smartphone and stop responding to the ding as if am one of Pavlov's dogs.

This is possible to ignore, I keep telling myself.  Go write.  Go read.  Go weed a garden.  Go pluck your leg hairs, one-by-one, with a pair of tweezers.  Anything trumps waiting for that darn DING.

I'm hoping, by October break, that this truth will have settled into my bones and I will be back in the world of the living, not in the zombie-state of dingdom in which I am currently living.

But for now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go pluck the hairs on my legs while I watch a pot of water boil.

DING!