I am having trouble falling asleep again. I am thinking about gardening and book shelves and how very stressful it is having our things on the boat still. By the time they arrive it will have taken over four months. I don’t have perfect recollection of what is on the boat and I am at the point where I really don’t want to buy duplicates of things because that is a waste of money so I just kind of… fuss because I don’t even know what I am waiting for but I can’t buy things to fill my needs. It feels horrible.

Deficient: (in something) not having enough of something, especially something that is essential; not good enough

Retarded: less developed mentally than is normal for a particular age

I am having a lot of feelings about both of those words. Anger. Rage. Fury. Sadness. Despondency. Anxiety. Frustration. Defensive.

There is a strong idea that home schooling harms children. That it makes them unable to develop “normally”. This idea doesn’t come from one person or one place, it comes from many places. I find it utterly infuriating and enraging to have to deal with this idea. I’m not feeling very rational about it. If it were coming from one place or one person I think I could cope. I think I could parse my feelings down into a little bucket and figure out how to talk about them. But it isn’t coming from one place it is coming from many and I feel like instead of being able to process it with any of those places I am engulfed in a tidal wave of upset and I utterly cannot engage with why this is such a motherfucking insulting concept.

I need to find a way to wrap my brain around useful words though. My kids need me to. They need me to be able to advocate for them in a way that does not include just saying “Fuck off” to authority figures. I have to find eloquent words to go through why it is utterly unacceptable to use such words and I am failing. I am fucking failing.

Because those words are a contemptuous indictment of me as much or more than my children. Because I home schooled them and if they are deficient it is my fault. That was literally the point of home schooling. There is no one to blame but me. But are they deficient or are they different in a way that would have been true no matter how they were schooled? Are they struggling more or less than they would have if they were put in school when they really didn’t want to go and it would have been a daily fight? I have no crystal ball. All I have is documentation from Stanford that the way I home schooled is the ideal learning environment.

But in Scotland all home schooling is termed interrupted learning as if home educating means that all learning was interrupted.

My kids were going to be weird no matter what. Look at their parents.

Be bitchy nice. That was the advice of the mom I talked to on the playground. Demand that the school change the words they use. My experience is that schools are abusive and the only thing you can do about it is leave. Take your football and go home. But I don’t want to yank my kids out because of one fucking cunt. I need to find words that are effective and clear and commanding.

Don’t. Insult. Children.

If you cannot talk about children without using insulting, rude language do not work with them or discuss them at all. Your nasty opinion is utterly unhelpful and can in fact be damaging.

Children can have areas where they struggle. Children can have areas where they need extra help. Children can require extra support to be successful.

THAT DOESN’T MAKE THEM FUCKING DEFICIENT YOU PIECE OF SHIT MOTHERFUCKER.

Not good enough.

Go straight to hell you presumptuous cow.

Clearly something is going on and clearly I am not going to be direct about it. BUT I’M HAVING A LOT OF GOD DAMN FEELINGS.

My children are articulate, self-aware, sensitive to the emotions of others, expressive, have incredibly large vocabularies, can figure out how to play with people across social classes, can eat at fancy restaurants around the world with perfect table manners (no matter what table manners mean for that country), and they have unreal memories for data. But yes, they have things they aren’t perfect at. So. Fucking. What.

I am so angry I could spit nails. And I have no choice but to deal with this. I have to be the adult. I have to advocate. I have to ask for meetings and use my big girl words and not swear at all. Even though I want to say a lot of incredibly rude words. Even though I want to break things.

I would much rather think about gardening.

For the record: I am only interested in discussing difficulties in communicating with professional educators if you are in fact a professional educator. I have no desire to speak to other parents about this whatsoever. There are a myriad of reasons for having this boundary. I don’t need to share them all. Or any.

I still fucking hate school.

And yet I consider going back to university. I would like to work with kids who have emotional problems. I want to research incest. I think it will require more schooling. My ass is going to be in the special needs office saying, “Hi I’m Autistic, I have ADHD, PTSD, GAD, and arthritis. I absolutely require the use of a computer; it is abusive to require me to hand write.”

Fuck hand writing. Fuck hand writing being the fucking measure of someone’s motherfucking intelligence. Why don’t you fuck yourself with a fucking chain saw.

Maybe my kids need to be allowed to type as well.

Maybe it is time to find a game that teaches touch typing.

Maybe I should just think about gardening instead. I want a subscription to the lovely gardening magazine Jenny gave me a bunch of old copies of. That thing is detailed and fantastic. Over the winter I am going to sit down and start planning all the things I can do once I’m allowed to plant. I can get started in September! There’s lots to plant in September! Given the budget we want to follow next year we are going to be doing basically everything in cash. So at the end of the month I will be able to put the money I save from the hoped for budget into a jar for gardening. That’s my gardening budget. I’m not in California anymore with a tech salary. I can only buy things as I can afford them on a fairly tight income. I am choosing to make my budget much tighter than I think we will fully maintain. Hm. That sounds not-right. I always budget as if we have far less money than we do. Because I will fuck up and go over my plans. I am aiming for a really really low figure. Much lower than I think we will manage. Because then when I go over it I am still at a reasonable level. And I am going to do this partly by limiting myself to cash. Easier to say “We have no cash in the envelope” than “I don’t want to use the credit card”.

Gardening is not going to be a big part of the budget. I am probably going to become that lady who asks if I can take clippings. I only get to buy plants/hard scaping stuff once I have saved up enough money. I’m not planning to travel any time soon. Well, we have to go to Edinburgh for official stuff. But the whole trip is going to be in the neighborhood of £300. Lodging and train are costing £140 and I plan to bring snacks/meals for the train. We aren’t staying long. We aren’t going to fancy restaurants nor Do All The Things. We will get passports taken care of and notarize the sale papers for DVC. Then we will come home.

We will only be awake and available for entertainment for like 9 hours total in the city anyway.

I’m tired. I don’t want to hang out. I really don’t.

I’m tired so why the fuck can’t I sleep? Because I have to be bitchy nice with officials and the idea makes my stomach hurt. I feel sick.

Gardening. Gardening is fun to think about. Book shelves will be paid for out of DVC profits. After the book shelves are paid for the rest goes into investments.

Paint will have to be saved up for.

It occurs to me that I don’t want to get rid of all the cardboard boxes. I want them for gardening and painting. Hm. For gardening: it will be a great way to kill a bunch of the lawn so I can plant more interesting things there. For painting: tarps ain’t free and if I can put cardboard several layers deep over the carpet I don’t need tarps. Hmmmm. Ok. I convinced myself.

Before I kill lawn I need to see where things come up in the spring. I hear there are bulbs out there. I will have to mark the lawn somehow to protect the bulbs when I rip out grass. I’ll figure that out.

We’ve gone out and done some winter pruning as a family. It was really fun. I love how much my kids love working with me. I love watching them take pride in their growing abilities. They are quite competent at a wide array of skills.

NOT GOOD ENOUGH MY AUNT FANNY.

Fuck petty educators.

Gardening. Book shelves. Stop ranting in your head, Krissy. It won’t help.

I am scared I won’t be able to help.

I feel bad about myself.

I feel like I must be a shitty teacher. Only I know I am not. Only I feel like I am. All home schoolers have experienced “interrupted learning”. I want to puke. I am so fucking mad.

Dogma. Fuck your fucking dogma.

Just keep swimming.

Draw a picture or some shit.