Did You Pack a Snack?
In my dream, I am Mom to Lisa Simpson. I do not have giant blue hair – I am just me – but Lisa Simpson is my daughter, and it’s the morning of the SAT test.
I can’t think of anything to feed my daughter. I want her to have something with protein, something that will nourish her brain. I end up scooping out a mound of peanut butter the size of a baseball and putting it into a bowl with some bread underneath. It’s the only thing I can imagine that has protein.
Lisa Simpson pushes the peanut butter around in the bowl. She looks at me helplessly.
“Do you want something else?” I ask. “Did you pack a snack?” I start to get up from the table where, apparently, I’ve been sitting next to her like she’s a toddler.
Just then, about ten complete strangers walk through our kitchen. They are all heading out the door to go to school, boisterously.
“Is it really 7:50?” I screech. I look at Lisa Simpson; there’s fear in both our eyes. We know we needed to be there at 7:45 or we wouldn’t be able to take the test.
Poof! We are in the school. It’s 7:51.
“Please,” I beg the vice principal, who is guarding the door. “Please let her take the test.” Wordlessly, the vice principal ushers her in, rolling her eyes at me for my incompetence. Lisa Simpson disappears down a long hall, away from all the other students for social distancing reasons.
It’s then I realize: she doesn’t have her snack! I whip out a toddler cup with a lid, containing chopped apple, and I slide it down the hall like a skee-ball expert, and it lands at the doorway of the exact right room. An adult hand reaches around the doorway and picks it up.
Then I panic: She doesn’t have her water! She doesn’t have any water! How is she going to get through the whole test without any water?
But it’s too late. She has no water, and she’s late for the test, and all she’s had for breakfast are a few bites of crunchy peanut butter. It didn’t even occur to me to give her extra number-two pencils or a calculator.
My soothing, clanging alarm went off as I realized: I am the worst mother in the world.
I got out of bed and went downstairs to find Shane making peanut butter toast for breakfast. I slathered on the peanut butter, just like he likes it, because he let me. I got him a banana – but I offered to chop an apple for him.
Then I raced to get him a water bottle – one that would keep the water cold for hours – and filled it to overflowing. Proudly, I added that water bottle to his pile.
I asked Shane 14 times if he had his snack, his calculator and his pencils. I could see that they were right in front of him, along with his COVID mask, but I asked anyway.
Then I drove Shane to school for the first time in more than a year, and dropped him off to take his SAT test.