Volunteered As Class Mom

Another weekend down for the real estate family.

I volunteered to be Class Mom for both Princess Roundhead’s 2nd grade and Chubs’s Kindergarten. The good part is that I’m co-class mom for both classes with my mom-friends. That makes it much more tolerable. The bad news (for my co-class-moms) is that I’m the asshole and they are the respective nice ones, so, they’ll be consistently mopping up behind me. Both the girls have amazing teachers who I love, so truthfully I love being involved to help the teachers and spend more time with the kids. But there’s a definite downside.

So, you know when you get to that part where you can’t do something yourself and you need other parents to volunteer and they could not give two shits that their help is needed? That’s the part that irritates like a plastic tag in your cotton underwear.

I was chatting with one of the moms who I was co-class mom with last year. This year our girls are in different classes but she’s Class Mom for her daughter’s class. We were sharing Class Mom woes on the playground on Friday. (I know, I’ve become every cliche possible right now.)

She told me that a parent came up to her and said: So you’re the Class Mom?
Her: Unfortunately.
Him: Why do you say that?
She then lost her filter and said: I didn’t want to do it but no one stepped up. People seem to not understand that the reason Stoddert is so highly desired is because the parent involvement got this school to where it is now but it’s the same people doing everything. No one volunteers for anything. People think all this just happens magically. Bit it all falls on the PTO and the Class Moms to do it.

Well, that was refreshing. I was shocked she actually said it. I didn’t even do it justice in my written version. The way she conveyed it was so satisfying, I was looking for a cigarette to light. I’m good at being passive aggressive in emails or on this blog, but to say it to someone’s face? Hell yeah! She said he slinked away with that “sorry I asked” face.

This weekend was the Fall Festival. Think: food trucks, bounce houses, pumpkin painting. Last year if anyone besides me recalls (#StillBitter) the Class Moms of Pre-K were told a week before the event that it was “customary for the Pre-K to run the costume shop.” Not many people signed up to wo-man that booth and this year was no different. I saw the two class moms sitting there all day because no one else in their class volunteered.

I hate people. Did I ever say that I hate people? I hate people. Between this and rescue it’s hard not to hate people.

We had much of the same for our Kindergarten class sign up. Less than half of the families signed up to help watch our oversize Connect-4 game. I emailed the entire class on Friday night and asked how it could be possible that less than half the families would volunteer, and to please take a look at the list and sign up for a quick half hour shift.

Not. One. Additional. Person. signed up. NOT ONE. I could smell them through email, heating up their queso and turning on the football game.

I get it, you’re soooo busy. But I too am working 55-60 hours a week, helping run a dog rescue, getting a podcast off the ground and raising 2 kids. My house hasn’t been clean in a year, I can’t remember the last time I went to the grocery store, I’ve seen zero shows on Netflix that everyone is raving about, Chubs told me I’m never home (again,) and we only get help from a nanny for 2 afternoons a week. And now I decided to train for a 50 mile walk this winter. Suck it. We’re all busy.

And if you live in Glover Park you are probably familiar with this other thing we have to contend with known as the Russian Embassy. They mysteriously installed cameras all over Glover Park, but when contacted about it to ask if they would release footage if there were a crime caught on the cameras, they SAID NO (allegedly, according to list-serv mania.) To add that insult to injury, the other problem here is that their children also get a seat in our public schools.

This may not be a popular opinion, but being that I have State Department clients and friends who have shipped out to other countries and whose children went to the “American School” in that country, I fail to understand why children of Embassy Parents who are here for just a year or two have just as much right to a seat in our schools as the people who live here, pay taxes here and contribute to the city. Wouldn’t it make more sense to allow a DC Resident who is “out of boundary” into the school than someone who is here temporarily and has zero interest in our city?

Like I said, not a generally popular opinion but the school is massively overcrowded. The teachers and our kids are suffering because of this. It really makes private school look better, honestly.

I’d like to say I’m now retiring the phrase “Class Mom” but I’m pretty sure we all know that’s not true.

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