Sophie Goes to Kindergarten: The Pre-K Jitters

I thought I was the only one who was nervous.

This morning I had a quick meeting with Gordon, Sophie’s pre-school Gordon. He has a very long beard and a very short window of time to talk — his priority is the kids, which I love.

But he wanted to meet this morning to tell me two things he’s noticed recently, about Sophie.

First, he said, she is starting to seek attention from her peers.

“That’s great!” I said.

Um, no. Apparently this is going on in an “immature” fashion — Sophie is grabbing other kids’ toys and getting upset when they react negatively. She grabs like a 3-year-old and reacts like a 5-year-old, Gordon said. Instead of screaming and crying, she gets sad, trying to hide her tears and disappointment at her inability to engage.

Rip my heart out.

Second, Gordon said, Sophie is clearly nervous about kindergarten. I haven’t ever seen Sophie really exhibit anxiety about anything at all abstract. “Scawy!!” for a ride at Disneyland, sure, but nothing less concrete than that.

But he insists she’s worried. He can tell, he told me, because Sophie talks a lot about her teacher and going to school with Annabelle. She seems fine with that, Gordon said, but she asks for Mommy more than usual.

I wanted to walk back into that pre-school room and grab Sophie up and — what? Take her to work with me? Home school her? Not good scenarios for either of us.

I need a cocktail.