You Better Get On It

Day #4

Being the parents of a high school senior is a wee bit stressful.

 I sometimes get this feeling like I’m on the brink of hyperventilating.

And by sometimes I mean A LOT.

It began when we were back-to-school shopping BEFORE SCHOOL EVEN STARTED at Nordstrom Rack.

I was checking out and they very young sales lady asked what grades the girls were in. When she heard McDaniel was a senior she asked what colleges we’d visited. When I said none so far, she looked at me and said,

“Really?! You better get on it!”

I don’t think I’ve been the same since.

Just a constant state of 

“You better get on it!"

The second week of school our schedule ramped up to INTENSE.

The meetings. 

The deadlines. 

The meetings. 

The questions. 

The meetings.

It seems like everything requires an online registration.

Everything.

And last I checked, 

technology is still nursing 

a pretty serious grudge 

against me.

Remember?
Siri thought I was suicidal.

I finished the summer feeling pretty good since we had already had McDaniel’s senior pictures taken.

That quickly dissipated at the register of Nordstrom Rack.

I mentioned going to visit a few colleges this summer but seriously, who wants to see an empty campus with little to no students?

So we didn’t.

I quickly scheduled a few official campus tours on two different Fridays in September.

Both required online registration.

And several prayers that I wouldn’t throw 

my laptop into the backyard

 if the registration wouldn’t just submit 

FOR.THE.LOVE.OF.PETE.

But they were scheduled and all seemed good.

For almost 2 days and 2 seconds.

Then McDaniel got some neat opportunities that conflicted with the two Fridays that we had planned to be on the campus tours.

So I had to cancel them.

Guess what? 

That required me to fill out an 

online form to “unregister” her.

Throw back to when we didn’t go on college visits.

We just applied, 
got accepted 
and then showed up on move-in day.

Since McDaniel isn’t sure she wants to go to a small liberal arts school, a Christian school, a mid-size or large state school or any of the above out of state, we REALLY need her to get on some campuses to get an inkling of what feels like home to her.

Some of these schools have looming application deadlines.

Excuse me while I breathe into a lunch sack.

I’ve been scanning various schools for new tour dates but they all seem to be during the week and would require McDaniel to miss school.

Due to her neat opportunities, that’s not an option right now.

Saturday tour dates are few and far between and all seem to be later than the application deadlines.

So Monte and I came up with a different plan.

We looked up the football schedule of three different schools that are within driving distance.

We figured we could do our own self-guided tour of the campus and then attend a football game to get a feel of the school spirit and culture of the school.

School spirit and pride means a lot to McDaniel. She has put a bit too much weight into her decision to pursue a college based on its school colors and mascot.

And if they have a football team.

She promptly threw away a beautiful, well-written promo piece for a small school that had magenta and black as its school colors and a Muskie as its mascot.

The muskie has teeth and wears a sweater with a M on it.

McDaniel would have none of it.

I would like a quick minute with the board in charge of 

that color and mascot decision. 

Maybe losing the sweater would help 

the intimidation quality of the muskie a teence?

McDaniel started getting emails and phone calls from schools all excited about her upcoming visit.

The schools I had online “unregistered” to tour.

McDaniel tried to explain that we had to cancel.

I wanted to yell,

“But I almost drop-kicked my laptop out the window trying to unregister for the tour online!!”

But it didn’t matter.

Those hours were long gone.

And somewhere, 

somehow, 

I knew Siri was behind it all,

saying in her judging way,

“You better get on it!"