As Sisters Begin Solo Journeys

One down, two more to go.

My oldest child started classes last week, heading off to begin high school, while her sisters enjoyed their final days of summer vacation. Today my middle daughter starts a new school. And tomorrow, my baby heads off to third grade.

Three children on different schedules, at different schools.

The staggered start has had its blessings.

We’ve had a chance to ease back into the school-year routine, to gradually work out the kinks in our schedules. And I have the luxury, for once, of dealing with each girl’s first-day jitters one at a time, rather than en masse.

But the procession unnerves me as well, because it heralds the start of a new era in our family: sisters, but not schoolmates any longer. And as they set off for separate campuses, I fear the loosening of a bond that has kept them tied to one another. And anchored to me.

*

I envision the logistical nightmare that will emerge over time.

Three school calendars to keep track of, three lunch menus to consult each day. An endless procession of back-to-school nights, concerts and plays, parent conferences to make time for. Fifty miles to cover, delivering children to school, before I even set out for work each morning.

But that’s not what worries me most. In five years as a single mom, I’ve grown accustomed to balancing, juggling, cutting corners. I’ve accepted that I cannot do everything, be everywhere. I’ve come to rely on friends and neighbors for help. My daughters have learned to rely on one another.

And now, for the first time in those years, they will each attend school alone.

No sister on the schoolyard to look out for or up to. No familial presence to consult or offer comfort when your teacher yells at you or you lose your lunch box, when you get picked last for volleyball or the boy you have a crush on says he likes your best friend.

No one who can spot you on the playground and tell just by the cant of your head, the way you walk, the sound of your voice, whether you’re having a good day or bad.

I remember the feeling from my childhood, when my younger sister and I attended school in lock-step through the years.

Sometimes her presence was a nuisance. When I refused to wear my glasses--because they made me look like a geek--she dutifully reported to my mother that she’d spotted me sans specs in the hall. From then on, my mother bound them to me with an elastic band around my head.

Sometimes she was a burden, when I had to comfort or tend to her. From second grade on, it was my job to walk her home. And with every playground feud, she looked to me to intervene.

Then there were those times I saw my image reflected, larger than life, in her eyes: smart, brave, popular, friendly. . . . From my pedestal, two grades above her, I realized that she worshiped me.

And in the midst of my own classroom troubles or playground squabbles, I found solace by imagining myself as my little sister envisioned me.

*

It may be liberating, I suppose, to attend school on your own. No siblings around with a family agenda to impose; no pipeline to Mommy to keep you in line away from home.

No more little sister embarrassing you, blabbing to your friends that you’re not allowed to watch R-rated movies. No big sister to report to mom that you got benched for sneaking onto the middle-school yard to use the Coke machine.

No need to travel with an entourage, to risk being late for school because someone else can’t find her shoes or decide what color hair ribbon to wear. No more hanging around after school because one sister has a Brownie meeting or another has a soccer game.

Still, my girls will miss each other. I know it, even if they don’t.

On her big sister’s first day of school last week, my little one roused from sleep just in time to catch us as we dashed out the door.

“Wait,” she yelled, as she ran down the stairs and thrust a piece of red construction paper toward her sister. On it, she had scrawled in crayon, “Don’t be scared at the new school. You will have fun.”

The high school freshman knelt down to hug her little sister.

“Love you,” she whispered.

“Love you, too,” her little sister murmured back.

Then--the red construction paper tucked inside her backpack--my oldest headed out the door for her new school.

Separate maybe, but not alone.

Sandy Banks’ column is published on Sundays and Tuesdays. Her e-mail address is sandy.banks@latimes.com.