Last Day of School

20 June 2013

Kory left early for “work” today down at the Miracle House and didn’t come home until he’d put in a full day’s labor.  He was alone today, as Kaleb and I stayed behind to have a little chat about his Algebra scores.  It took me two hours to talk him out of his funk, and to help him see the good that came from doing so poorly (78%) on the test.  He admitted he made mistakes in studying and he saw how his attitude about some of the lessons affected his final outcome.  They were teaching several different ways to come to the same conclusion but he refused to learn the other ways because they took so much time… but in the end, that’s what bit him in the butt because he was supposed to show his work through those lengthy processes he didn’t want to learn.  Now he knows that following instructions is for his own benefit.  But I told him if he did the best he could, he should just be proud of the fact he got a final grade of a B on a university level math class when he was only 14 years old.  Not many can pull that off so I tried to get him to focus on the positive a bit more.  Eventually, the tension broke and he agreed to get out of bed!  Whew.

We went for a long walk together after he got up, as he had hoped to spend time at school today saying farewell to his old classmates, but since he wouldn’t get out of bed, he sort of missed that chance.  He did go to his friend Toban’s house though and for the first time since we arrived, was able to spend some time with him.  He was sure glad for that.  I walked on a little further and went to a luncheon held by my friend, Bente, and enjoyed just a little stress free peace and quiet with friends, as Kaleb’s attitude was very draining.

I was going to walk the hour walk back home again, as it was a nice day, but about 15 minutes into it, I walked past a friend’s house and she was just getting in her car to go to work, so she gave me a ride home.  Lucky me.  I actually needed that extra time for packing today as I’m starting to feel a little pressured to get more things done than are done, and I’m wondering when I’m going to say goodbye to everyone if I’m packing and cleaning the last few days. 

All my bags needed to be repacked and reweighed so I could fit in the things I bought for Kory’s 70^th birthday party.  At least now that’s over and done with and I got four more boxes filled with stuff I won’t be using between now and Monday. 

Tina stopped by with Daniel this afternoon as Daniel wanted Kaleb to come over for the night, so we visited with them for a little while before Kaleb was ready to go.  Another friend called to say we are welcome to use the apartment in their basement anytime we want to come back to Norway, so we don’t have to wait two years until our tenant moves out to return. I thought that was nice, and who knows, we may pop back over here for a week or two sometime, if the ticket price and timing are right.

I’ve been holding back tears all day as I’ve been packing up and thinking about how long two years seems before we return.  I know time goes by quickly, but two years seems like an eternity right now.  I’m sure going to miss this place.