By First day of school was Monday. I know this because I have been counting down to it and dreading it and yearning for it in equal measure — the way every parent of school-age children does, that impossible contradiction of wanting summer to last forever and also wanting someone else to be responsible for your children's enrichment for seven hours a day so you can clean teeth in peace.
I woke up at 5:30 without the alarm. Just — awake. The way you're awake before a surgery or a flight or a thing you cannot stop from happening. I made coffee. I packed three lunches in the dark kitchen: Chloe got a turkey wrap with lettuce and the mustard she likes and an apple and a granola bar. Jayden got a ham and cheese sandwich, Doritos (I don't usually buy Doritos but first day of school gets the good chips, this is a rule I made up and I stand by it), a string cheese, and an orange. Elijah got — and I need you to understand the negotiations that led to this — a cheese quesadilla cut into triangles (beige, orange-adjacent), baby carrots (orange), a clementine (orange), Goldfish crackers (orange), and a juice box (the orange kind). His lunch looked like a sunset. A delicious, monochromatic sunset.
Elijah was up at 6:15, dressed in the outfit he picked out himself: khaki shorts and an orange t-shirt with a triceratops on it. He stood in the kitchen with his dinosaur backpack on both shoulders, too big for his body, the straps adjusted as tight as they go and still hanging past his waist. He ate half a waffle and declared himself ready. He was ready at 6:20. The bus didn't come until 7:10. He stood at the window for fifty minutes. I let him stand there because the excitement of a six-year-old is not something you redirect; it's something you witness.
Chloe appeared at 7:00, fully assembled, unbothered, a woman of the world at fourteen. She ate a banana. She said, "Bye, Mom." She was out the door when Destiny's mom pulled up at 7:45. No fanfare. No backward glance. Tenth grade doesn't need me at the door. Tenth grade barely needs me in the building. I am learning to be okay with that, the way you learn to be okay with a tooth you've lost — the gap is there, you notice it, you stop poking it eventually.
And then it was Jayden. My boy. Eleven years old, six-grade-bound, wearing new jeans and the blue Nikes that Lorraine bought him for back-to-school because Lorraine cannot resist buying that boy shoes. He came out of his room with his backpack slung over one shoulder — one shoulder, because apparently both shoulders is for elementary school and he is not in elementary school anymore, he made this clear without words, just the physics of the sling, one strap, the universal signal of a kid trying to be older than he is.
I drove him. As promised. We took the Altima down Murfreesboro Pike and turned onto the road that leads to DuPont Tyler Middle, and the school was bigger than I remembered from the orientation — bigger and louder and full of kids who all seemed to know each other and where they were going. Jayden didn't say anything for the entire drive. Not one word. I didn't push. I turned on the radio — 95.5, the country station — and let Garth Brooks fill the space between us because sometimes the kindest thing you can do for a scared person is not make them talk about being scared.
I pulled up to the drop-off lane. He didn't move for a second. Just sat there. I said, "Hey." He looked at me. I said, "You know the combination." He almost smiled. Not quite. But almost. He said, "Yeah." I said, "You've got your lunch." He said, "Yeah." I said, "I'll be right here at 3:15." He said, "Okay." Then he opened the door and walked into middle school with his backpack on one shoulder and his combination lock in his front pocket and whatever he carries inside him that I can't name and can't touch and can't fix, and I sat in the drop-off lane until someone honked and then I drove to work and I did not cry. I did not cry until I was in the break room at the dental practice putting my lunch in the refrigerator and Dr. Pham said, "How was the first day?" and then I cried. Just a little. Just enough.
He survived it. He came home Monday afternoon and said, "It was fine." Fine. The most useless and most reassuring word in the English language. I asked about the locker. He said, "Got it open on the second try." I asked about lunch. He said, "I ate it." I asked about his teachers. He said, "They're fine." Fine fine fine. A symphony of fine. I took it. I took fine and I held it and I was grateful for it, because fine is not bad. Fine is not a phone call from the principal. Fine is not tears in the parking lot. Fine, from Jayden, on the first day of middle school, is a gift.
Elijah's report from first grade was considerably more detailed. His teacher's name is Mrs. Patterson and she is "really nice and also kind of old." He sat next to a boy named Mateo who shares his enthusiasm for orange things (or at least didn't object to the monochromatic lunch). They did a worksheet about the letter A, which Elijah found personally insulting because he already knows ALL the letters, Mama, ALL of them, he learned them in KINDERGARTEN. I said, "Everybody reviews, baby." He said, "Well, they should review faster." He's going to be fine. He's already fine.
By Friday the routine was taking shape — the 5:30 alarm, the three lunches, the bus and the carpool and the Altima, the seven hours of teeth and fluoride, the 3:15 pickup. I made a big pan of baked ziti on Wednesday — the kind of dinner that says, "I had exactly thirty-five minutes and this is what thirty-five minutes looks like." Ziti, jarred marinara (I am not ashamed, I will never be ashamed, the jar exists for a reason and the reason is Wednesday), ricotta, mozzarella, a handful of spinach that Chloe ate and Jayden ate around and Elijah did not acknowledge. Baked at 375 until everything melted into everything else. It made enough for dinner and three lunches the next day. The ziti was recruited. The ziti was enlisted. The ziti served its country.
Three kids in three schools. The house is quiet from 7:45 to 3:15 and I thought I would love the quiet but the quiet is strange — the absence of their noise is its own kind of noise, the echo of cereal being poured and sneakers on linoleum and Elijah explaining the social dynamics of Goldfish crackers to a stuffed tiger. I'll get used to it. I always get used to it. Adaptation is my whole personality. Adaptation and ziti.
By the time Friday rolled around, I had packed fifteen individual lunch components across three kids and five days, and the thing I kept wishing I had was something small and hand-held and already done — something I could tuck into a bag without negotiating with anyone about it. These PB&J Bites are that thing. No baking, no cleanup worth mentioning, and they hit exactly the note a lunchbox needs to hit: familiar enough that nobody complains, good enough that the container comes home empty. Elijah would like you to know that the jelly is, in his words, “the orange kind” — but any flavor works, and that’s sort of the whole point.
PB&J Bites
Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 0 min | Total Time: 45 min (including chill) | Servings: 20 bites
Ingredients
- 1 cup old-fashioned rolled oats
- 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
- 1/3 cup honey
- 1/4 cup strawberry jam or grape jelly (your kid’s preference wins)
- 1/2 cup mini chocolate chips (optional, but recommended)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- Pinch of salt
Instructions
- Combine the base. In a large mixing bowl, stir together the oats, peanut butter, honey, vanilla extract, and salt until fully combined. The mixture should be thick and hold together when pressed.
- Swirl in the jam. Add the jam or jelly and fold it in gently — just a few stirs. You want pockets of jam throughout, not a uniform blend. Fold in the mini chocolate chips if using.
- Chill the mixture. Cover the bowl and refrigerate for 30 minutes. This firms everything up and makes rolling much easier.
- Roll into bites. Using a tablespoon or small cookie scoop, portion out the mixture and roll each portion between your palms into a 1-inch ball. Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet or plate.
- Set and store. Return the finished bites to the refrigerator for at least 10 minutes before serving or packing. Store in an airtight container in the fridge for up to one week — or freeze for up to two months.
Nutrition (per serving, 1 bite)
Calories: 88 | Protein: 2g | Fat: 4g | Carbs: 11g | Fiber: 1g | Sodium: 38mg