Fieldtrips

I hate fieldtrips.  I can't remember a single fieldtrip that I have gone on that I enjoyed.  Probably a good thing that I didn't get a full time teaching job, huh?!  I have friends that volunteer to go on every single fieldtrip with their kids, even the weeklong ones that cost them hundreds of dollars.  Not me, well to be honest, none of my kids have gone on a weeklong fieldtrip.  Eric was supposed to go on one in fifth grade but we wouldn't allow him to because no parents were welcomed to go and he would be chaperoned by teenage boys in his cabin.  We said, no way and we bought him a Nintendo Wii instead. All of his friends came back with a bad case of poison oak so he was glad to have missed out.

Anyway, back to my point about hating fieldtrips.  I can't remember the last time I went on one.  Next week, the twins and Erin have fieldtrips.  I know for sure Erin wouldn't let me go on hers.  Zach already told me no to his.  I didn't discuss it with Nate.  So yesterday I got to thinking that Nathan is getting older and so in a few years he won't want me to go on a fieldtrip with him anymore.  So maybe I should take advantage of this time and go with him.  I really battled it out internally because as much as I like going with my own child, it's the rest of the class I don't like chaperoning.  For some reason, the teachers always seemed to give me some of the harder kids I guess because they thought I could handle it and because they knew me since I volunteered in the classroom often.

I finally decided to bite the bullet and go on this fieldtrip.  I approached Nathan this morning and asked him if he would like me to go.  He had one word for me, "NO."   I thought he was joking, but nope. He has already reached that stage where he doesn't want me to go either.  Oh, how sad that makes me. My last little one has grown up.  Fortunately he is still really cuddly with me and who knows, maybe that won't change.  Eric is pretty affectionate too.  But he wasn't for a few years.  So maybe Nate will stop for awhile and then go back.  Erin and Zach aren't cuddly at all.  But that's ok. We are all different.