End of term

Is it me or does it feel like this school term has flown by in a matter of minutes? The weather doesn't help; I don't feel like we've actually turned the corner yet, am still waiting for the day that I feel that yes, now I can finally pack away all the coats for a few months. But actually I think it's the relentless routine, the frantic mornings, the urgent deadlines, work crammed into the hours available, then home, sleep, and it all starts again.
But that wasn't the point of this blog post. No, my subject du jour is End of Term, and what I mean by that is all the lovely events that herald this date. Sports day. School production. Things you don't want to miss, things that you want to record, and play for your squirming child when they have reached the grand old age of eighteen.
But can you make it? What if you do manage to book a day off, then it rains and it's rearranged for a day when you're presenting something important and can't get away? Will your child grow up angry and withdrawn if you fail to make it to anything, or are we actually heaping way too much pressure on ourselves to make every single thing? How many of you are brave enough to give your child a kiss, tell them that they'll be brilliant but that mummy has a meeting she can't miss, and wave them off? And is that child going to be more or less resilient, more or less attention seeking than the child who's parents attend every single thing they're in?
I mean, hey, don't listen to me, because I'm the one who moves heaven and earth and goes to EVERYTHING. But, actually, last year I didn't make sports day. Not because of work, but because my youngest saw fit to throw himself back on his new high chair (since binned), which wasn't massively stable and propelled him backwards so he smacked down on the tiled floor. Not a great thing to happen at 7.30am. Fortunately he was fine, but I had to take him to A&E just in case, which meant no one to cheer on my eldest as he competed in... well, whatever he competed in. I wasn't there, remember?
And did he care? Does he even remember now? No, he doesn't.
There's a moral in there somewhere.
But in the meantime, I've got a calendar to organise...