Eye Drops

On Friday morning I realized that Owen wouldn’t get his antibiotic  eye drops if I didn’t give them to him in school.  He had spent the night with his grandma on Thursday and I had put the drops in his eyes before he left, and kept the medicine for Eric (aka- Collector of Germs).  Grandma was going to pick Owen up at school, and take the monkeys for the night as Eric and I were still quite sick.

I took the drops down to Owen’s school office and asked them to send Owen from class, for his drops.  Most teachers like to send students with a friend, and I idly wondered who Owen would show up with – probably Charlotte  (often listed as one of the best parts of his kindergarten class).  I was quite surprised to see Mrs. Perry walk in!  The kids don’t have library or PE or music on Fridays, so I wondered where the rest of the class could be…but then I saw Owen and forgot all about it.  He was terrified!  His eyes were huge , his brows furrowed, and when I made eye contact with him, tears began to stream.

Poor Owen had never been called to the office before, and he and I had never talked about that scenario ever coming up.  Owen doesn’t take well to new things and will often get quite nervous.  Mrs. Perry probably couldn’t explain why he was going to the office because the office had not told her when they requested Owen.  (Mrs. Perry later told me that on the way to the office,  Owen had even asked if she would stay with him in the office the whole time.)

I had been hugging Owen say, “You were nervous about why you were coming to the office – and what a good surprise – you’re Mama was there.”  He had a big smile on his face then, and uttered a small, “yeah,” but the tears didn’t stop, and he hugged me tighter.  We snuck into the nurse’s office to have a bit more privacy – and it still took awhile for him to feel settled.  I said something to Owen about him only being in the office for good things because he is a boy who tries to follow rules and be nice.  After all, he was a Kind Kid for the school. 

I wonder now if that was the right thing to say.  At the time, I just wanted him to feel better and not be afraid of the office.  But he is surely capable of making “bad” decisions, and of being unkind.  I would like to think that he will never be called to the principal’s office for something negative– and it is unlikely, but it isn’t completely unimaginable.  I guess I need to think about that a little more… then again, being afraid of being sent to the principal’s office can’t be all that bad – maybe Owen will pass the concept down to Jack…

I walked Owen back to class after I gave him the eye drops.  And I realized why Mrs. Perry had been able to walk to the office with Owen – it was recess.  Owen put his coat on, and ran up to the outside door, but came back immediately.  “Excuse me Mrs. Perry, but why are the kids lining up?!?”    Opps.  Luckily for me, Mrs. Perry allowed Owen the great honor of opening the outside door for the other students. 

Ower the weekend, I asked Owen about his day at school on Friday.  He informed me that it was completely worth missing recess to be allowed to open the outside door.  “Mrs. Perry never lets anyone do that.  Noone has ever EVER done that before.  Just me.”  I did not point out that all the kids are outside at recess and are thus unavailable to open the door under normal circumstances.  I was just glad that it got me off the hook for scaring Owen and making him miss recess!!