Do you know what I LOVE about the end of the year?  Elementary school yearbooks.  There is seriously NO better use for my $17 x 2. 

For some insane reason, seven years ago I felt the need to purchase my eldest child a yearbook.  He was in first grade.  You can’t possibly leave first grade without a yearbook, right?  It seemed silly not to buy one the next year too.  I mean, it would be like collecting only one saucer in a place setting, right?  Totally pointless.  And incomplete.  We all know how I am about incompleteness.  So I set a precedent for this child and all the Bythelbs children that were yet to come.

A couple of months ago my girls brought home a “last chance to order your yearbooks” notice.  I had never seen a “first chance” notice, but thought I’d better get my sweet fanny down to that school and order those yearbooks before it was too late.  I asked the lady in the office for some order forms.  She said they didn’t have any, but I could just write the check and include a note that said it was for a yearbook.  No official forms, huh?  Just include a note, eh?  The whole thing sounded sketchy and more than a little unadvisable, but what was I to do?  It was my last chance!  So I wrote out the checks (one for each child) for $17.  (When on earth did elementary yearbooks start costing $17?  They were always $8-10 at the other school.  You’d think the ridiculous price would be enough for me to refuse to purchase on principle, but we’ve already started the set, see, so there’s just no going back now.)  I was sure to make a note in the memo on the check with my child’s name and that it was for a “yearbook”, and then I wrote another note on a full size sheet of paper with my child’s name, teacher, grade and FOR YEARBOOK.  I stapled the checks to the notes and then hand delivered them to the office.  (This is what you call foreshadowing.)

Well, last Friday Goose comes home from school and wants to know why she didn’t get a yearbook.  They’d handed them out in class that day and she didn’t get one.  Of course she didn’t.  So I looked at our checking account online to make sure that the checks had cleared, which they had, and printed out copies of the canceled checks to present to the school office on Monday.  I went into the office and told the lady (the same “just put a note with your check” lady) that my daughter did not receive her yearbook.  “Did you check with her teacher?” she asked with more than a little hint of the “You’re kind of an idiot, aren’t you?” tone.  I told her that no, I hadn’t.  She told me to check with her teacher.  So I traipsed down to the end of the school with BigHugs in tow and checked with the teacher.  She consulted her list and surprise, surprise, Goose wasn’t on it.  I went back to the office and explained that my daughter wasn’t on the list.  The lady consulted her own list, which coincidentally looked IDENTICAL to the one the teacher had.  (I might also add that the lady picked up the list from the counter right in front of her.)  Sure enough, Goose was missing from that list too. 

“And you paid?” she asked.  I told her I had paid and had copies of the canceled checks with me.  She waved me off and said she didn’t need to see those and proceeded to hand me two yearbooks.  She was perfectly happy to take my word for it.  Coolio.  And then she added Goose’s and DynaGirl’s names to the list with the special notation “says she paid”.  Um, excuse me.  I didn’t “say” anything.  I didn’t “pay”.  I paid.  It was all I could do to keep my mouth shut.  I just kept thinking that now I would be That Woman.  That Woman who “pays” for things.  Next year I’ll walk into a room of PTA moms, introduce myself and then watch as they exchange knowing glances and under-the-breath, behind-the-hand mutterings.  “Says she paid.” My reputation will forever be suspect. 

And for what?  The yearbooks suck.  Worse than usual and at twice the price.  I am such a chump.