Family photo 2013

Family photo 2013

Saturday, July 12, 2008

I saw it at the store....

it stopped me dead in my tracks.

My heart began to pound.
My eyes grew misty.
My lip began to quiver.
My knees became weak.
My vision started to blur.

I looked at my young shopping companion, Tyden, quizzically. Could it be? Already? That time?
He looked back at me, quizzically.
What in the world is your problem mom and when can I get my candy treat for being your grocery store escort?

It was:
The Back To School Supplies.

They were right in front of my face, in huge, overflowing, green bins. Seemingly shouting at me, taunting me: Your kids will soon be leaving....spending their days with me instead of you....Ha ha ha.

It was like a horrible dream with a cold sweat.
Then I remembered.
Oh yes, We're homeschooling this year!
Yipee! Yea! Yahoo!
A wave of relief washed over me.
Thank you Lord.
Thank you for our freedom to choose how to educate our children.
I am thrilled.
JOTSC and I will spend our moments and days together and this precious time is a most treasured gift.
I feel so blessed.

Along those lines, here is an interesting article I ran accross on another homeschooling mom's blog: It was written by a non-home-schooler.
SONNY SCOTT:Home-schoolers threaten our cultural comfort
6/8/2008 9:39:01 AM
Daily Journal
You see them at the grocery, or in a discount store.

It's a big family by today’s standards - "just like stair steps," as the old folks say. Freshly scrubbed boys with neatly trimmed hair and girls with braids, in clean but unfashionable clothes follow mom through the store as she fills her no-frills shopping list.

There's no begging for gimcracks, no fretting, and no threats from mom. The older watch the younger, freeing mom to go peacefully about her task.

You are looking at some of the estimated 2 million children being home schooled in the U.S., and the number is growing. Their reputation for academic achievement has caused colleges to begin aggressively recruiting them. Savings to the taxpayers in instructional costs are conservatively estimated at $4 billion, and some place the figure as high as $9 billion. When you consider that these families pay taxes to support public schools, but demand nothing from them, it seems quite a deal for the public.

Home schooling parents are usually better educated than the norm, and are more likely to attend worship services. Their motives are many and varied. Some fear contagion from the anti-clericalism, coarse speech, suggestive behavior and hedonistic values that characterize secular schools. Others are concerned for their children’s safety. Some want their children to be challenged beyond the minimal competencies of the public schools. Concern for a theistic world view largely permeates the movement.

Indications are that home schooling is working well for the kids, and the parents are pleased with their choice, but the practice is coming under increasing suspicion, and even official attack, as in California.

Why do we hate (or at least distrust) these people so much?

Methinks American middle-class people are uncomfortable around the home schooled for the same reason the alcoholic is uneasy around the teetotaler.

Their very existence represents a rejection of our values, and an indictment of our lifestyles. Those families are willing to render unto Caesar the things that Caesar’s be, but they draw the line at their children. Those of us who have put our trust in the secular state (and effectively surrendered our children to it) recognize this act of defiance as a rejection of our values, and we reject them in return.

Just as the jealous Chaldeans schemed to bring the wrath of the king upon the Hebrew eunuchs, we are happy to sic the state’s bureaucrats on these “trouble makers.” Their implicit rejection of America’s most venerated idol, Materialism, (a.k.a. “Individualism”) spurs us to heat the furnace and feed the lions.

Young families must make the decision: Will junior go to day care and day school, or will mom stay home and raise him? The rationalizations begin. "A family just can't make it on one income." (Our parents did.) "It just costs so much to raise a child nowadays." (Yeah, if you buy brand-name clothing, pre-prepared food, join every club and activity, and spend half the cost of a house on the daughter’s wedding, it does.) And so, the decision is made. We give up the bulk of our waking hours with our children, as well as the formation of their minds, philosophies, and attitudes, to strangers. We compensate by getting a boat to take them to the river, a van to carry them to Little League, a 2,800-square-foot house, an ATV, a zero-turn Cub Cadet, and a fund to finance a brand-name college education. And most significantly, we claim “our right” to pursue a career for our own
"self-fulfillment."

Deep down, however, we know that our generation has eaten its seed corn. We lack the discipline and the vision to deny ourselves in the hope of something enduring and worthy for our posterity. We are tired from working extra jobs, and the looming depression threatens our 401k’s. Credit cards are nearly maxed, and it costs a $100 to fuel the Suburban. Now the kid is raising hell again, demanding the latest Play Station as his price for doing his school work … and there goes that modest young woman in the home-made dress with her four bright-eyed, well-behaved home-schooled children in tow. Wouldn’t you just love to wipe that serene look right off her smug face?

Is it any wonder we hate her so?

Sonny Scott a community columnist, lives on Sparta Road in Chickasaw County and his e-mail address is sonnyscott@yahoo.com.

4 comments:

Holly said...

ha!
I was reading the beginning of your post thinking to myself that you might like to see that article when BAM there it was!
wasn't that so well put?
Jake and I LOVED it!

Amy© said...

Whoo hoo! I'm famous! Thanks, Tisha!

I know what you mean about both rejoicing in being a homeschooler, and being shocked by the school supplies. I'm not ready! School here starts August 13! (When I was a kid, school started right after Labor Day. You know, back in the stone ages?) The good thing is, by the time I'm ready to buy more school supplies, they'll all be on major clearance. I heart clearance sales!

chrisnoelle said...

Good thing we don't have a real school supply list.....

I admire your choice. good for you. I might join you one day.
Now, how many days left until school starts..?????

JK LOL
love ya

Katy said...

Really well-written article. Gives you pause about how we nurture our kids, as a society. You keep rowing upstream girl!

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