If You Leave Me Now

My nursery school was a small, white one-storey building, about a mile from my house. It was a one-class building: no other classes were held other than my own nursery class. There were about 30 of us in the class, and two teachers.

One detail I remember vividly about my first day of nursery school: my mother had to remain the entire day.

When my mother took me to the nursery school that morning and started to leave, the problem was not that I was so attached to my mother that I could not bear the thought of being separated from her for even a few hours. Rather, I believed, literally, that my mother was dropping me off at this strange place, which was to be my new home, and that she was returning to her home, and that this was farewell. I didn't grasp that I would be spending just a few hours there, and then would return home. Given this belief, little wonder that I was seized with a sense of panic.

Years later, I began to wonder why I was practically the only one  (one other mother had to stay as well) with this misconception. Was it that all of the other parents had explained to their children how school worked? Were the other kids more intuitive than I? Did they have a more trusting nature? Did I have too vivid an imagination?

I'd be fascinated to learn what really was the difference between what was going on in my mind and what was going on in the other kids' minds that day.