2012: Entering The Final Campaign

It seems like yesterday when we walked you for your first day of kindergarten. You were ready and willing to take on the challenge. We weren't, yet somehow we survived, largely by taking the day off and moping.

You charged through the door at the end of the day and your adventure began.

For the first several years you made immediate friends with the crossing guard, in fact, you became her right hand man. The devotion you had for each other was quick and sincere.

When she announced her retirement we were stunned and worried. At her retirement celebration at school, I wept while trying to read a proclamation I created from the community group I joined. It was one of the most embarrassing moments of my life but I did it with you in mind and heart.

It was there we first learned of your unique challenges as a second-generation ADHD'er. It was also there that you formed long-time friendships with every teacher you had. Despite the jumping up to watch fire trucks race down the thoroughfare, you somehow knew the answer for the question your teacher was asking.

Before we knew it your days as an elementary school student were over.

Riding the bus was a new journey as grade school was a mere two-block walk. This time you befriended the bus driver. That wasn't a surprise.

The classes were tougher, the challenges difficult. The small-school quaintness was gone, replaced by metal detectors and a more serious faculty. Some embraced your uniqueness, while for the first-time ever, others didn't. But somehow you survived.

The most life-altering changes in your life were to come that last year in middle school and after that you were uprooted to a high school full of strangers in an entirely different culture. Sometimes the personal struggles overshadowed the job-at-hand. It hasn't been an easy hoe in any way, shape or form.

Tomorrow you lace up the sneakers for the last, first day of school. Despite some of the biggest challenges of your life, you only missed two days of school last year (one so you could attend Wings Over Pittsburgh for your true love--the Civil Air Patrol), and one because no one else was going to school at the end of the year (against my better judgement, of course). The grades--they could and should be better--but you can blame the first-generation ADHD'er for that one.

Through it all, I'm proud of you and love you more today than yesterday. It won't be as much as tomorrow. I eagerly await--and dred--that final day of classes and what your future entails. It's not the way I wanted it to end for you, but we adapt to our circumstances.

You'll do fine. It's a remarkable day, an unbelievable time. Enjoy your senior year in high school, son. Embrace every day, each experience. It's a ride you will never want to forget.