High School Orientation (for parents)

Understanding how to get into the parking lot is the foundation of your high school parenting experience. For some parents, those of you won’t read the communications sent out with maps attached very clearly showing entrances and exits, you’re going to want to allow yourself some practice runs lest you embarrass your high schooler entering an exit, and/or attempting a U-Turn that morphs into an 80-point turn.

U-Turns are not allowed.

You will be tempted, and might succumb at times, to tell your high schooler about life back when you experienced these four years, but do you remember that scene in Romeo and Juliet when Romeo is throwing a fit and the Friar is telling him to calm the heck down; that he knows what this is like, and Romeo is all, “THOU KNOWEST NOTHING OLD MAN.” We encourage you to keep this scene in mind if a story were to bubble up inside your middle aged-soul, and instead, consider fundraising. Some claim it as a “necessary evil,” others leave out “necessary,” but everyone does their part, and so will you. Attached to this message is the scene in Romeo and Juliet along with three billion opportunities to help out. We’ve highlighted the lines in the play for efficiency, and those opportunities that read, “Co-Chair, 3-5 hours/week,” will most likely end up as Chair positions and be 48 hours a day. Please plan accordingly.

We tell our students constantly we have zero tolerance for inappropriate social media posts, and really, this applies to you, too. To be clear, you are in this story, but this is not your story. Do not take pictures documenting the first time you and your high schooler set foot in school. Absolutely do not take their band hat, that they are mortified to wear, put it on your head, and start marching, while pretending to play the trombone YOUR TIME HAS PASSED.

This is why parking lot etiquette and participating in fundraising are vital factors to the high school parenting experience. These types of activities are designed to help the parent feel as though they know something, and they are a part of something, while at the same time reminding the parent that this is the high schooler’s world and parents are the spectators. We do not need you to make Play-doh or bring snack. We do not need you to make sure your carpool number is hanging from your rearview mirror so we can bring your kid to your car. There are no carpool numbers and your kid should be able to find you when she needs to.

We need you to read handbooks, and sign things. We need you to write dates on calendars and show up to games and meets and concerts and plays and watch as your child does the brutal work of emergence.

Maybe understanding the parking lot and being a part of fundraising will push you to emerge, too. Train for that half-marathon you’ve been talking and talking (and talking) about. Sign up for a dance class. Finish writing that book.

Stand in line at the post office and stare at the lady in front of you who is wearing a blouse with flip-flops on it, and wonder if there will be a day when you too will want to wear a flip-flop blouse. Or, a blouse. You are closer to 60 than you are to 17, so why not embrace who and what you might become, and how you’ve already changed instead of hanging on to what once was? Romeo was right, the Friar understands his growing up experience, and he has to let Romeo figure this out too, as tragic as this sounds. We all know what could happen.

John Mayer’s “New Light” plays over head while you wait in line and consider pairing a flip-flop blouse with cuffed jeans and wedge sandals. Maybe flip-flops, or would that be redundant?

You tap your foot and sing along and remember when your now high schooler didn’t want to go on the Pumpkin Patch Field Trip without her dad because she was planning on picking out the biggest pumpkin there ever was, and she didn’t think she’d be able to carry it alone, so you texted her Kindergarten teacher because your then Kindergartener was frantic and crying and you know how these sign-ups work – you have to get in on them weeks, sometimes months beforehand. There is no day of signing up, especially for the Pumpkin Patch Field Trip.

“She will have help,” the Kindergarten teacher tells you. “She won’t be alone to carry it.”

You don’t know why “New Light” makes you remember your now high schooler who was once five years old and wanted to bring home the world’s largest pumpkin, but please pay attention to what you’re supposed to be doing now:

Pay the postage.

Keep you hands at 10 & 2.

Drive safely towards whatever it is you are supposed to do next.