I didn't want him gone for 6 hours everyday.
I would miss him terribly!
But I had to let him go
so we went clothes shopping
to Sears
Penneys
where Amy whined because she didn't get any new clothes
and Annabelle sucked her thumb
while Adam tried on pants
shirts
got new undies
hid in the dressing room and wouldn't come out
made me get the clerk to drag him out
put up his dukes like a macho cowboy
and play-punched the girls
and made them cry
and just in general was obnoxious
so that I was glad when we were finally leaving
and it was then he spied it-
THE HAT!
It was a soft gray man's hat
with a green grosgrain ribbon wrapped around it
a chicken feather stuck in the ribbon
and Adam wanted it.
I tried to explain to him
that it was a man's hat
too big for him
certainly not suitable for kindergarten
but he insisted that he was a man
and he wanted it.
Of course I didn't buy it for him.
I figured he'd forget about it.
But the day before kindergarten started
he informed me that he wasn't going to school
without his hat.
I just sighed.
Here I was
upset and missing him already
hemming up his pants
ironing his shirt
and here he was
his one-track mind
centered on a hat with a chicken feather in it.
"I'm not going without my hat,"
he said off and on all day.
By supper-time I was worn down
what with one thing and another
so I went to Sears
plunked down $7.50
and bought the darn hat for him.
I folded the receipt and put it in my purse
because of course he wouldn't actually wear it
and I could get my money back
and get Adam to shut up about the hat at the same time.
I had it all figured out.
Or so I thought.
The next day
Adam went off to school
in his new shiny brown shoes
his crisp creased slacks
his brown plaid shirt
his new undies
and his gray hat with the chicken feather in it.
I wondered what the teacher would think of me
for letting my son go to school in a man's hat
that sat on his little ears
covered his forehead
but had a chicken feather in it.
I spent the day beating myself up
for not taking a firmer hand with Adam
for not making him know that when I said no
I meant no
but the truth was that being a mother was harder than I had thought.
Adam came home without the hat
and when I asked him what happened to it
he said proudly
"Well, the teacher made me take it off
and put it on my desk
and Jeremy grabbed ahold of it
and chucked it across the room
and then Teddy got it
and he took the feather out of it
and stuck it up his nose
and then Marcia took the ribbon off of it
and tied it around her tongue
then Gordon got ahold of it
and stomped it flat like a Frisbee
and it sailed real good
but then the teacher got mad
and told everybody to sit down
and she took the hat
and threw it out the window.
And you know what, Mom
I'm the most popular kid in kindergarten
because everybody liked my hat!"
Music Playing: This Old Man
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This story is a continuation of Diary of a Preacher's Daughter.
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