We will introduce some works from the collection of works in past Oyako Day Essay contest.<\/p>\n
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IT’S JUST ABOUT BEING TOGETHER<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cYour stomach aches again? You know, if you say that every morning, people will stop believing it\u2019s true. Then when it really hurts, no one will help you. Now get up and get ready to go.\u201d<\/p>\n From kindergarten through first grade, for 4 years, it was the same every day. My daughter would complain of stomachaches and refuse to get dressed. Even if I drove her to the kindergarten, she wouldn\u2019t get out of the car. When it came time for us to separate, she\u2019d burst into tears, and I\u2019d be stuck with her at the doorway for twenty or thirty minutes. Back in the car, I\u2019d bemoan my own fate, try not to see my daughter following me and coldly leave her in her tracks. I\u2019d be filled with guilt. \u201cAll those happy students; why was it only my daughter\u2026\u201d I\u2019d think over and over again. In elementary school it was the same thing. Every day I\u2019d take her to school, to the doorway or all the way to her classroom, and every day she would make a scene when I left.<\/p>\n When I asked her why she hated school so much, she said, \u201cI don\u2019t hate school. I just don\u2019t want you to leave. I always want to be with you.\u201d When I heard my daughter say this, I was suddenly filled with regret. Until now, she hadn\u2019t said anything like that, just complained of stomach pains. I really felt that I\u2019d failed her, that I should have understood all this much sooner.<\/p>\n Around about that time, my daughter was reading picture book called \u201cGenki-san kara no tegami\u201d. It\u2019s the story of a mother who while in the hospital wrote letters to her daughter in the name of \u201cGenki-san\u201d to keep her spirits bright. I decided to do the same kind of thing. Because she\u2019d liked the book, I thought she\u2019d quickly get in the habit of checking the mailbox each day when she came home from school.<\/p>\n I wrote a short letter to my daughter and put it in the mailbox.<\/p>\n \u201cDear Yuna, thank you for checking the mailbox everyday. You\u2019re going to school everyday now. And you\u2019ve been helping out a lot around the house. Your mother\u2019s been so happy. From Genki-san\u201d<\/p>\n When my daughter came home, she found the letter and seemed to be crying while she read it. Though it may seem strange, she said she herself didn\u2019t understand why she was crying. I believe it\u2019s because I had finally accepted my daughter\u2019s distress, and it made up a little for all my blindness. After that my daughter gradually adjusted to school and was able to go there by herself. Now she\u2019s a sixth grader, and until this day checking the mailbox is part of her daily routine.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n age:39 yr | Female | Chiba Prefecture<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" We will introduce some works from the collection of works in past Oyako Day Essay contest. IT’S JUST ABOUT BEING TOGETHER \u201cYour stomach aches again? You know, if you say that every morning, people will stop believing it\u2019s true. Then when it really hurts, no one will help you. Now get up and get ready to go.\u201d From kindergarten through first grade, for 4 years, it was the same every day. My daughter would complain of stomachaches and refuse to get dressed. Even if I drove her to the kindergarten, she wouldn\u2019t get out of the car. When it came time for us to separate, she\u2019d burst into tears,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":2877,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3110","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-en","category-21","description-off"],"yoast_head":"\n