Up until the fifth grade, I had only missed one day of school. I prided myself on that fact, and the fact that I had earned four perfect attendance trophies. I was a pretty healthy kid, but even on the days I felt terrible, I still put on a brave face and drug myself to school. So you can understand my dismay and grief when I started noticing the first signs of chicken pox right before Christmas.
I had a Christmas
concert right after those first signs, and I threw a tizzy fit until my mom
allowed me to go. This angered my grandma, who accused my mother of
irresponsible parenting because I was contagious and was going to kill all of
the babies in attendance. I do not recall any babies dying that winter.
However, my mom did make me stay home from the ward Christmas Party, which made
me absolutely furious, even though by that point I clearly had the chicken pox.
I felt bad because it was my last year to participate, but I did survive.
At first I was mostly upset that my perfect attendance record
was shattered, but then I realized that it was kind of nice to just hang out at
home, especially since I didn’t feel that terrible, other than the relentless
itching. I think I went back to school the day before Christmas break, which
really didn’t make sense, but my five days were up, and being the overachiever I
am, I wanted to get back in the grove of things as soon as possible (despite the
fact that very little school work is every completed the day before Christmas
break).
After this experience, I was much more relaxed about missing
school. At least when I was sick; I still wanted those perfect attendance
prizes after all.
