November 29, 2005 - Tuesday
Harry stayed home from school today with a minor fever and a cough. He woke up saying he didn't feel very good and it was right to keep him home, even though a dose of Tylenol had him bopping around the house all day. However, that did mean that he needed to come with my to drop Jeremy off at school and again to pick him up. Harry said he just wanted to stay home and I seriously considered it - when is an appropriate age to leave kids by themselves for some short period of time? - but decided against it. However, I did let him stay in the car by himself when I walked Jeremy inside, figuring the preschool parking lot was a pretty safe place. I did, much to his chagrin, make him come inside the kindergarten office to drop off his birthday party invitations and some paperwork because that parking lot is so much more public.

Of course, all of that put me in a delicate place with Harry when he asked why I let him stay in the car at Jeremy's school in the morning. Specifically, it's against the rules, but I did it anyway. Hmmm. My answer was to just say what I thought: that because he was sick it seemed better for him and better for all the other kids at Jeremy's school if he just waited in the car. That seemed more important to me, I said, than the rule in this circumstance. I added something about it being a little unclear how old was old enough for him to stay home along and stay in the car by himself and that it seemed to me that it was OK for the short period of time. He said him understood and didn't say anything more, but could just picture the big red tab on the imaginary file folder in his young brain, saving the information for some later date. I know Harry and I know it is in there.


Comments, Opinions?