What's a Swamp Mother to Do?

I hardly know what to say about N’s school so far. I haven’t written much about it, except that we did not send him back to our regular school district this year, and that my coping with his entrance into high school has sent me in search of chocolate and purses. This education thing is hard. And the cumulative effect of all the years of being on guard and in defense posture may have made me a little wacky . . . and very wary. (You may think I meant “weary”. That, too.)

Seeing as our district made it somewhat clear back in the spring that they were going to assign him to a certain high school, I began to search out other options. I only did that after I spent several days at this school trying to figure out how it could possibly work for N. To say that the facility is woefully inadequate would be putting it mildly. The basement is mostly reserved for the students with special needs, and it is routinely called “The Swamp”. I spent time in the swamp, I sent N to “shadow” in the swamp, and I interviewed others who had swamp experience. I even have depressing quotes from a former swamp teacher who asked me not to repeat them. What is a “would be” swamp mother to do, except go rogue?

We left the district. Where we are now provides no special services. But they are more than kind and are accommodating in every way. The whole thing was the idea of my Neighbor Friend. (She is her own form of a super hero . . .) And she approached this very unusual school with the idea. And they said yes! Actually, not only yes, but, How can we help make this work and work well? Wow! We can scarcely believe it. The swamp mother thinks she likes life outside the swamp.