Let's Not Get Too Crazy

When we enrolled Benjamin in a traditional elementary school, I definitely had a few concerns. Would the school be too rigid? Would young Benjamin have any fun there?

Well, the school's approach to Halloween has confirmed a few of my doubts.

While not allowed to go to school in their costumes, the children were allowed to wear orange and black today. The guidelines emphasized that the children were not permitted to wear jeans, and added that if students did not have anything orange and/or black, they were to come to school in their regular uniforms.

I thought this was a bit odd. For example, what kinds of non-jean pants come in orange or black? I concluded that the children would have to wear either black or orange dress pants or cords. Since Ben doesn't own any of these, I thought I'd send him to school in his blue uniform pants and one of his orange T-shirts.

When I suggested this to Ben, he had a troubled look. He said he wouldn't be able to wear any of his orange T-shirts because they all had other colors on them, too.

 

Then I thought, maybe his orange vest? The only other colors on it were white and navy, which the kids wear anyway as part of their uniforms, and he usually wears a sweater vest to school. Surely this couldn't be too crazy for even a traditional school.

 

Benjamin was sure that this wouldn't do. He explained that they could only wear something that was plain orange or plain black.

We didn't have a chance to go to the mall to look for something plain black or orange, and I couldn't find anything suitable while doing our regular shopping . . . so I asked Benjamin what he wanted to wear to school. He said, "I want to wear my uniform."

What has this school done to my Benjamin?

 

I was tempted to just send him to school in his pirate costume to see what would happen, but in the end he just wore some orange and blue socks--socks are not covered in the dress code (as far as I know).

 

I wondered what the other kids would be wearing when we got to school, but sure enough, most of them were wearing their uniforms. A few had on black dress pants with plain orange T-shirts. One little boy went so far as to sport an orange polo shirt with his black dress pants, and another was wearing an orange turban with a black jacket and orange pants.

As we drove past the fine arts elementary school on our way home I saw a little Darth Vadar chasing a bride, three princesses swinging from the monkey bars, and several jungle animals playing out on the field.

I wondered if we'd chosen the right school.

I guess it's a good thing Halloween only comes once a year.

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Later in the day. . . .

I have to add that things turned out a little better than I'd thought. When I picked Benjamin up from school I learned that they'd played Halloween games in the gym all afternoon (Pumpkin Olympics), their teacher gave them Halloween goodie bags, and I noticed some of the older kids coming out were wearing T-shirts with designs on them! I guess Ben got to have some fun after all :)