There is one week that reigns supreme for me as the best week of the entire year. It has been this way for as long as I can remember, but was reinforced into the solid number one gold standard of perfection when I became a teacher. It is the last week in May.
Why? It’s not because of Memorial Day (which I spend half the day accidentally calling Labor Day). This week is special because it is that window of time between school letting out and June beginning. June means summer. June means pools and barbecues and vacations, checking the expiration dates on the sunscreen, and eating al fresco at nine p.m. It is glorious. But that last week in May is even better because the clock hasn’t started ticking yet. The countdown to the best season of the year has begun. The anticipation is at its peak and there are only good things to come.
As a teacher, summer meant later mornings and no makeup, but it also meant beginning lesson plans for the fall and conferences and the idea of “doing it all over again” with a new group of students. The last week of May, however, was limbo. I just finished exams! I don’t have to put on real clothes! And no one can expect me to do work right now. I would go to Panera, buy a hazelnut coffee and cinnamon crunch bagel, and sit outside and do the crossword, like the old lady I secretly wished I was.
As a parent of a child with special needs, this last week of May tastes even sweeter. It means I am done with the early morning drive to school. Done packing the school bag. Done emailing Charlie’s entire team regarding whatever next meeting we have coming up. The Extended School Year (ESY) doesn’t start until June, so I don’t have a new group of people who have to familiarize themselves with him. I get to make him pancakes and sit with him on the porch playing Jimmy Buffett and Paul Simon on top volume. We have our favorite trip to Colorado to look forward to at the end of July, which will also mark the end of summer. But we won’t think about that now. We will think about fireflies at dusk and grilled hot dogs and catching up on blissful sleep. It is a week of deep breaths and rejuvenation and the release of the tension of the frenzied pace of the academic year. It’s perfection.
Maybe for you this week is the time between Christmas and the New Year. Maybe it’s Thanksgiving when everyone comes to town or you get out of town. Maybe you are the parent of older kids and it’s the precious time when they come home before all their friends for college break and you soak in that stolen time with them.
Whatever your week is, I encourage you to embrace it. So often we race from one task to the next, one holiday to the next, one deadline done, and on and on. Find your week when all that can stop. If you can, try to build that into more of the year. Mental health days exist for a reason. Take your time. Fight for it. Soak up the rest it gives you so that you can better care for those who need you and for yourself. You deserve it.
Jamie Sumner is a special needs mom and author.
Jamie-Sumner.com
Author of the middle-grade novels:
