Pre-School Open Night: How (not) to make an impression

I used to wonder why I am so bad at putting names to faces. People always remember who I am, but I’m not so good at remembering them. Am I egocentric? self-absorbed? What’s wrong with me? Now I realize that I am usually dying of mortification when I meet anyone, and so people remember me more than I remember them.

Take last night. We’re walking past my girl’s new preschool on open house night. Carrying a clear plastic bag full of child poopoo because my girl just HAD to go RIGHT NOW and there's no garbage in sight. "Hi, I'm Maya, A’s mother. Oooh, don't shake this hand. And for godssake, don't look down or breath, okay?

Dog owners can carry little plastic bags with no shame. Parents should be able to do the same. And I should have them on my person at all times these days. It happens more than I’d like to admit, heeding the call of nature in nature. We’ve not been arrested yet. I’m sure it’s only because we live in DC and we’ve never yet held up the presidential cavalcade in the process.

Coincidentally, I really thought long and hard about putting my daughter in a Jewish dayschool. When your kid refers to every African American male she sees as Obama, you know you are spending too much time in the exclusive company of Jews.

Anyway, we left the open house 45 minutes before the poo incident because I was cranky. With my usual foresight, I had forgotten to eat that day, so when I noticed myself snarling at the poor membership office administrator because there was a queue, I realized we should go. Right NOW. Did I really want to be seen as “that Mom”? No, I did not.

To be fair, my daughter and I arrived early, and we were alone in our new classroom, with our new teachers, for approximately 78 minutes before that. (To my credit, I refrained from commenting on the teachers’ rhyming names). Just as we were leaving, others began to arrive. So we stayed. Then I had to carry a screaming child out. You know the back-arch, stiff-body sequence?

What were we doing between open house and poo bag? Grocery shopping. Always an iffy thing to do during low-blood-sugar, pms, end-of-teaching-week fatigue. But necessary for Shabbat. So I’m carrying my book bag, groceries, kid’s backpack, and then my child heeds the call of nature in nature. And it’s an unnatural amount. Then she wants to be carried.

Well, those parents will ALWAYS recognize my face.

I wouldn’t recommend this method for making an impression. Bringing cupcakes is probably safer.