Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Hello again




Hello again everyone. C'est moi, just checking in.
Things have been pretty busy at Casa Plumb. Dad is still dad, of course. Sometimes I wonder where he gets the energy. He did another concert just last week. Mom is still mom, which means we get a steady diet of ambrosia and sharp commentary about our lives. She has not gotten over the fact that Bassy left Sunset Valley and is now a movie star in Bridgeport.
And Andy? Well, he is still Andy.
The other day I was checking the website for the new boarding school that's going to open in Sunset Valley pretty soon when he walked in. "You're really not thinking about sending the kids there, right?" he asked me.
"Actually, Andy, I am," I told him.
"What the heck is wrong with you?" he asked me. "You adopt two children from Egypt only to decide to send them off to some finishing school."
"I'm not sending them off, Andrew. I'm giving them opportunities I never had. Isn't that the point?"
"No, the point is to be there for them and give them love and attention, not to ship them off to the next person. You don't spend any time with them as it is. I don't know how you do it, between managing your aunt's estate, this household, and your brother's movie career. You're stretched way too thin."
"My brother has his own manager, and as for Aunt Margaret's estate, I have a financial planner."
"The point is, why are you even considering these schools?"
"I want my children to have the finest education possible. I've battled with the Sunset Valley school system long enough. Since they don't get that my children have special needs, then someone will."

"How much do these schools cost?"

"The one I'm looking at, Smuggleworth, is $1600 a child."

"Four children? By my math that's $6400."

I shrugged. "We can afford it. Besides, I could get my parents to chip in too."

"Savannah, that's not right. Sending your kids off to boarding school is not the way to go! What kind of mother are you?"

"Someone who grew up in a household that valued education and is seeking the best way of giving her children that much better a head start in life."

I sighed. I knew somehow that this was not going to end well.