I have no political skills; I believe I'm constantly at war with my son's school system, and I make no effort to disguise my profound irritation. I'm like a Paul Giamatti character--in every phone call, every meeting.
By contrast, my spouse is Eleanor Roosevelt; he finds a way to build consensus. He wears a charming mask. He is just as annoyed as yours truly, on a regular basis, but you would never, never guess.
When I send a tart, terse note to the "child study team," my spouse immediately follows up: "So excited for the winter concert! Icy toes...chilly nose....Wintertime is here!"
When we are asked to purchase a "supplementary" hearing test, my blood boils. ("Your child wouldn't sit still, so you really need to confer with a specialist....") But my spouse takes Josh to the hearing test, and when things inevitably devolve, he invents a solution. "Look, just sign the form," he says to the doctor. "Josh can hear. I'm going to whisper a question, now, and you watch. Josh will answer."
This sort of thing--predictably, astonishingly--"gets the job done."
"Not everything has to be adversarial," says Marc. "You, too, were a teacher once..." (I'm cackling with glee, because there is a Saturday snowstorm, and I know it will not trigger the implementation of the district's overly liberal "snow day" policy....)
I nod--but then I remember that the school has scheduled four consecutive half-days. Four! To handle the "massive" burden of parent-teacher conferences. And my head throbs, once again.
Those fuckers can rot in hell.
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