Lion and Magic Boy

As my nose slowly fills with mucous and my head fills with cotton candy, one word and one word only comes to mind:

fuck

fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck

Oh my goodness, why all the cursing, you ask.

Because tomorrow I will be sitting in the back of a classroom smelling of chalk dust and feet (why does every single school smell the same? why?), attempting to remain surreptitious while armed with a camera with which I have been tasked to take “candid” and “beautiful” “portraits” of twenty-some seven-year-olds while at the same time resisting the urge to snort great quantities of said mucous back up into my nose where it belongs instead of allowing it to drip out onto the floor. This will undoubtedly call all manner of attention to the fact that I Have A Camera and I Am Pointing It At People, which will in turn make for some decidedly uncandid and unbeautiful stilted little photographs, and I will eventually be shunned by the entire Waldorf School community for Failure To Be Properly Artistic while at the same time Failing To Participate (this was exactly the one thing I have agreed to be volunteered for all year).

In addition, Eric may be coming down with something, as he was unusually affectionate this evening, choosing to sit, or actually lay, on my lap most of the evening. Plus Serena said that she “hurt all over”, a typically suspicious symptom but regardless one worth some attention to determine its validity. Both children may well have to remain home from school tomorrow, which only will prolong my photographic agony until another day, but I presume that I am of course the Last Parent to be taking photographs of their assigned class, in which case I will hold up the whole process of creating this year’s yearbook.

I always used to wish for fame but I don’t think this was what I had in mind. Headline: Waldorf Parent Pelted With Knitted Animals And Strange Felted Stuff Due to Fellow Parents’ Ire Over Non-Participation.