Like every other family in Bethlehem, we are doing school at home. Beyond the challenges of also working two jobs from home, getting James to do his schoolwork is an exercise in patience. Or frustration.

I quickly gave up trying to work with him in the afternoon after my day job ended for the day. It is the worst time of day for him. He has ADHD, and it makes doing any work with him challenging.

I finally did most of his work with him over the weekend, breaking it into five-minute sessions, spread an hour or more apart.

Some of the papers had three questions grouped close together. Even an adult with a steady hand and a ruler would have had trouble filling in the responses. James’ first response covered the whole response area. So I grabbed another sheet of paper to finish the responses.

When we were finished, I organized everything in preparation for scanning and uploading. The last sheet felt a little heavy. I turned it over. A splotch of blue Play-Doh was in the back center of the page. Luckily, I caught it before it went through the scanner.

So the first file I sent to his teacher was “assignments minus one page.”

I scanned the Play-Doh page on its own. Given the trials of getting the work done, a little Play-Doh stain? No big deal.

The shutdown/isolation is challenging, and different. But at the end of the day, we’re home, and safe. Love is what matters, Play-Doh and all.