MARK MY WORD: LIFE, LIKE KINDERGARTEN, NEEDS A SUPPLY LIST

It's official. Our oldest daughter, Becca, is enrolled in kindergarten.

This isn't one of those Kodak moments. Parents are never ready for their children to grow up, except, of course, after an infamous ketchup spill, temper tantrum, childhood disease or other natural, family disaster.

After hearing from other mom friends, Joni was convinced she better get Becca enrolled before the elementary school ran out of kindergarten slots. The school has three kindergarten classes, but as a parent you can never be too careful.

Never mind that the current school year isn't over, 55 other 5-year-olds had already been signed up by their parents by the time we walked into the principal's office last week.

"You've got plenty of time," one school staffer told us. But Joni and I weren't convinced. When it's your child, you worry about getting one of the last 20 kindergarten spaces in the school.

We had to make two trips to the principal's office because we forgot to bring Becca's immunization records. Joni managed to bring all the other necessary paperwork.

As a dad, I didn't know about any of this stuff. Moms seem to have a sixth sense about what's required to enroll your child. It also doesn't hurt that they talk to other moms who have been through all this before.

Dads don't do that. Even if we couldn't fall back on mom, we'd never think of talking to other dads about it.

Fortunately, for children everywhere, moms do such a good job with this enrollment stuff that most of us dads don't have a clue as to how it is done. We just wake up one day and find that our children are in kindergarten class.

But having accompanied Joni on Operation Registration, I got a first-hand look at how it is done.

The school secretary spent most of her time talking to Joni. Meanwhile, I stood around the nurse's office trying to look like I knew what I was doing.

Of course, I knew Joni could handle this registration thing all by herself. But as a '90s dad, I wanted to give her moral support. OK, it was our lunch hour and I was just along for the ride.

Before we left, the secretary told us which kindergarten class Becca would be in. She handed us an instruction sheet and warned us not to lose it. Joni immediately did what any good mom would do, she put it in her purse for safekeeping.

Purses allow you to cram in a lot of things for safekeeping. Wallets don't work as well. For some people, it's tough to keep money in them, much less anything as important as kindergarten instructions.

The instructions include the all-important list of kindergarten supplies that parents must buy. No government handouts here.

We must provide a cigar-sized school box, preferably without the cigars. We must also provide a regular size box of colors, a pair of scissors, a bottle of Elmer's Glue, two to three sharpened pencils, a backpack or school bag, a towel or small braided rug for rest time and pay $15 a semester for morning snacks.

The thought of all these kids running around with glue, scissors and sharpened pencils is kind of scary. But then, kindergarten teachers know how to keep the scissors from sticking to the glue.

A 200-tissue box of Kleenex is optional. I guess it depends on whether your child has the sniffles or how much you cry when you drop them off at kindergarten that first week.

And, no, colors don't mean magic markers, as Joni made clear to me. Becca thought colors meant food coloring. That, too, is out. Even veteran kindergarten teachers don't want to keep track of a whole classroom of food coloring.

School starts Aug. 27. By that time, we'll have bought and packed all those school supplies a dozen times or more. Either that, or we'll have to hide the stuff.

Glue can make a terrible mess, particularly when 1-year-old daughter, Bailey, is helping out. At the pre-school level, life doesn't yet come with a supply list. For parents' sake, maybe it should.

~Mark Bliss is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.