Homeschool diary day two: My brain is like a Billy Roll

And a forest walk proves to be my tipping point.

My brain feels as though it has turned into Billy Roll. 

The children are more enthusiastic than me this morning. I wake early, head foggy with pandemic-induced anxiety and worry so weighted that it feels like I am worrying for the world. A pot of coffee goes down the hatch and I am feeling ready for the world.

The children whoosh me out of my bad mood by telling me that they are actually looking forward to homeschool today, and how it will be nice to be all together. I am sated by this. It puts a positive spin on proceedings.

We agree that school will begin once my morning meetings end, and I chirp ‘I expect to see teeth brushed and outside clothes on when I come out,’ before I disappear into my office/repurposed spare room.

An hour later I am greeted by the boys dressed for work… in their school uniforms. It gets them in the mood, they tell me.

We repair to the schoolhouse (kitchen table) and begin work for the day. While covertly replying to emails, I type ‘compound word’ instead of ‘no problem’ and lose track of my thoughts eighty-nine times as I navigate questions about Mental Maths (full disclosure – I Googled the answers).

Learning is hungry work, and everyone is starving twelve minutes in, which leads to questions of ‘when is Little Break’ and ‘what’s for lunch?’ I offer a platter of neatly chopped vegetables and fruit. They are rejected with force. 

I proffer my secret packet of fancy biscuits. This option is deemed ‘ok’ and I watch as the orange chocolate caramel digestives (If you know, you know) are inhaled in moments. They are still hungry. My nerves are jangling.

I can see emails popping in and with each vibration of my phone, my fingers twitch a little more. ‘Once they’re done you can get a good run at it,’ the angel on my shoulder whispers reassuringly. ‘No! You are emotionally spent. Your brain is nothing more than Billy Roll at this stage – sure you had to look up what compound words were just now,’ the devil on my shoulder counters.

One of the English questions on my 4th classer’s list is to give a word for a nasty ‘cold-like’ illness. We laugh at how the answer should be Covid-19 even though it’s probably flu.

A forest walk proves to be my tipping point

‘Oh I can’t wait to go to the forest later,’ my youngest pipes up as they head off for Little Break.

My brain explodes. I actually feel the cells erupting from tiny volcanoes of emotion inside my brain. But I put on my Nice Mother voice which comes out all squeaky and high pitched. ‘What do you mean, the forest, pet?’ 

He brings forth the tablet and gesticulates towards Google Classroom. ‘It says we can go to the forest if we like, and upload photos of what we’ve done.’ 

It’s not mandatory of course, and our teachers have all sent lovely notes saying that we are to do what we can but we are under no circumstances to worry about schoolwork.

But everyone has their tipping point, and so far, it appears a nature walk on a gloomy Tuesday is mine. And there are no more biscuits left and I’m hungry. When is Big Break?

It’s day two – the first real day of homeschool for us – and I’m wrecked.