I'm grateful for: surviving the truant officer; productive and lovely time alone; reading more Hebrew

Good morning. I fell asleep maybe four hours ago, but just woke up and now can't get back to sleep. It's 3am. It's a change for me to be up, but not because I've been up all night. I'm still tired with eyes burning though.

I can't remember yesterday already. Today John got me up around 8am to go to Kfar Saba for blood tests. We stopped at the bank to get some cash to pay the electric bill, then came home in time (I thought) to meet with the truant officer. But she didn't come. She didn't come at 10:30, which is when I had thought the appointment was for. And she didn't come at noon, which is when John had thought the appointment was for. We were just starting to plan what to do with the rest of the day when she finally showed up.

It was pretty horrible, but we got through it I think. She grilled us a bit, on 'socialization.' She actually went so far as to state that Simcha needs to see her friends every day. As if seeing your friends in school ever really counted for much. It's not like you get to talk, or gossip, or play together in school. It just means you get to hate the same teachers and pick on (or be picked on by) the same other children.

Unfortunately I couldn't say what I wanted to, which is if you are telling me the only reason for my children to go to school is so they can see their friends, you've already lost the argument. I mean, is or is not the reason school is mandatory the fact that children need to be educated to grow up to be good citizens and capable workers? And yet, the only reason I should send them to school is so they can be age segregated with other children with inadequate adult supervision and attention in order to see their friends EVERY DAY?!? I don't think so.

We smiled and nodded and were polite but quite forceful and determined that homeschooling is what is best for our children. We made it clear we had nothing against the schools (not true, but necessary here in Israel). We made it clear that we were only speaking for ourselves and our children. And we repeated ourselves many times as she kept reframing the same old tired bullshit and throwing it at us again.

We pointed out that Havva had finished school and was quite successful working in the navy. That Hans and Zechy had finished school by age 16 (although not finished learning), and that all of my children can demonstrate both thinking ability and knowledge of facts well beyond any of the schooled friends. We pointed out that homeschooling had been working for us for about seventeeh years, and really, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

The big issue, really, was learning Hebrew. And unfortunately I was not properly prepared, as all we had was a haphazard scatter of various Hebrew resources we keep all over the house. Fortunately what we able to show her with a moment's thought included two complete Hebrew language courses in addition to a Hebrew script workbook and several random bits of material. *sigh* It would be wonderful to be able to be organized.

She questioned Simcha a bit. Eliyahu wouldn't talk to her (he doesn't talk to anyone new). It turns out that the truant officer actually knows quite a bit of English.

So she's been, and she's gone, and I have no doubt that if we were staying here in the neighbourhood this would only be the beginning of the kinds of trouble she could make for us. She tried to tell us that the kids have to be registered in school until we ger our ishur (letter of approval). That's a great hoot, since several people I know have waited years to even get a response from the ministry of Education. Fortunately I knew of a court case, which is currently wending it's way through the Israeli supreme court, in which the judge ruled that the homeschooled children should remain learning at home until the case was resolved. I mentioned that, and she immediately dropped it. so that was good.

I'm glad she's been and gone because now that is over, but now I have a worry about what nastiness she could be planning for us from left field. She is NOT a nice person, although she covers it up with a lot of smiling and disengenuousness. If that is a word. I am very glad we are only going to be here for another month at most.

So she had gone by around 1pm. Which left us with a lot of left over nervous energy and nothing really to do. The weather was cold and wet, so it wasn't a good day to go out and do anything. Still, John packed up the kids and Neil, and headed out to give me some alone time in the house. It was wonderful! For me.

I spent some time copying some audio tapes onto the computer (I'm converting them all to mp3s, slowly). While getting some pretty good progress knitting. I finished up the skein of yarn I had on the placemat I've been carrying around with me, and rather that search for another skein in the middle of the tape, I also worked on the baby blanket I started, oy, almost two years ago, for a child of a friend who is pretty soon not going to be a baby by any measure. The blanket will make a nice shawl or lap blanket anyway (it's made of mohair). I made good progress on both, which was relaxing as well as satisfying.

Then I just lay down and read for a while, with some soda and healthy snack food nearby. It's probably been years since I was able to just do that. Alone in a quiet house, read, nosh, and not do or worry about anything else. It might have been good if I'd gotten some laundry folded but I didn't. And such is life.

John and the kids came back later than expected, and after my sister had phoned, so I was talking to her when they came in. It was a good conversation. Nothing really deep or meaningful, which is good sometimes too.

Supper was a random bit of macaroni and cheese, and I didn't get much else done. We all (except Hans) collected in the den to watch an episode of Waiting For Gd, wonderful show, and then I just fell asleep. As soon as Eliyahu had finally stopped talking. :-) In the new house we won't be sharing a room, and while I won't be entirely happy about that, I won't be entirely unhappy, either.

I think that's about it. I'm still pretty tired even if I couldn't fall asleep. I'm hoping, with the truant officer visit over, tomorrow will be a less stressful day, although all days will be a bit stressful until we are settled into our new home. We found a mover today, yippee!, who quoted us quite a fair price. So that's good.

Tomorrow we must pack more. And more. And more. It will not end until the day we move. *sigh* But, life is definitely good today.

I'm listening to Eliyahu snoring.

:: Yesterdays : Tomorrows ::

~~~Last Five Entries~~~
Hi and goodbye - 2010-10-15
I'll be moving on - 2010-10-10
Gold membership and stuff - 2010-10-10
Decisions, decisions - 2010-10-07
Days to go - 2010-10-06