First Field Trip

I accompanied Clara to her first school field trip to the pumpkin patch on the 22nd. Clara did enjoy herself but was very upset about one aspect of the day. Since the field trip took place on a day she's not in school, I was required to be there because of the student teacher ratio. Ok, so that's not too bad. I can handle that. What really upset her though (and me too frankly) was that she wasn't allowed to ride the bus with her classmates.

I'm usually not one to get upset about stuff like that. I mean, life's not fair and all. I'm just not sure why it was such a big deal. I mean, she's the only T/Th student in her class. There are four classes total and they all have only one T/Th student. Could four extra students really be that much more trouble? And what if Clara went to school MWF? Would they ask for a volunteer to not ride the bus? I did pay the same registration fee for Clara which covers field trips and yet I don't feel she's getting the same treatment.

So even with all of that, I still wouldn't be that upset. The thing is, Clara is in love with buses right now. I mean, she really, really loves them. She points out bus stops and buses. She points out ones that have a bench to sit at and ones you have to stand at. She gets excited to see people sitting at a bus stop. She wants to ride on a city bus and she can't wait to go to kindergarten because she thinks she's going to ride the bus. On top of that, there's a darn school bus emblazoned on her field trip shirt!

So it isn't hard to imagine her incredible disappointment when she discovered she couldn't ride the school bus with her friends. I told her that I would be taking her to the pumpkin patch and didn't even mention that everyone else would be riding a bus. The girl's not dumb; she somehow knew they were all riding a bus and she went ballistic. I think she's been excited about riding the school bus since we bought her field trip shirt in the summer. Imagine that; she thought she was going to get to ride a school bus while wearing her school bus shirt. I felt so bad for her.

She sucked it up though and had a great time. They got to go on a hayride and a train ride. They played on the playground, had lunch and then a hayride back to the front where they got to pick a small pumpkin to take home.

And then we had to leave. Oy. Her class was in line and I told her to go say goodbye to her teacher. She went to give her a hug and just broke down in tears. By this time Robert was tired and hadn't napped all day. I had been wrestling with him for 3 hours at the point and I just couldn't get her calmed down. I was beginning to think maybe coming on the field trip wasn't such a good idea. I really think I might skip any others. I believe they're all on Clara's non-school days and she just really can't handle it. Or more accurately, I really can't handle her inability to handle it. She cried most of the way home.

So, am I being oversensitive about this?