You hear about these mothers that clutch at the waft of air left behind when their children head off to school for the first time. They lament, they cling, then they wander the empty halls, unable to know what to do with themselves.

This is just not me. Sorry. School has always made me leaping-around-ecstatic for more reasons than can be contained here, but the main one being that school opens my children’s heads like a can of beans, and stuffs wonderful things in there. Both my kids thrive and love it – how could I be happier?

My five-year-old son Riley actually started at the British School of Beijing way back in 2005 – in pre-nursery – and he’s been full time for two years, so school is nothing new to him. It was interesting, then, the trepidation he stockpiled upon entering Year 1 last month. It was also interesting for me to feel heart-pulling emotion when he donned his Big Boy uniform and black leather school shoes and necktie (!) for the first time.

It kind of didn’t feel right. He just seemed too – too – little. Like a little lamb in a big wolf suit.

Is it a youngest-child thing? Is it the fact that he still fits two-year-old undies? Or is it that watching him enter this milestone experience hauls up the harsh reality that I’m now well past procreation, and no more babes will swim around in this womb during this lifetime? If that isn’t a slap in my own-mortality face, I don’t know what is.

Whatever the case, I was surprised to actually worry about him a little when he headed off to school sans Mickey Mouse backpack, and instead clutching a big boy school satchel. It was just kind of strange.

He had cried that morning, which was even more strange. Perhaps it was the uniform change that got him going – he otherwise had no clue as to the whole new school phase he was entering into. I reminded him all his old friends would be there and he had a lovely new teacher… Still, I worried – very uncharacteristically.

And those worries? Riley came home glowing, clutching a paper snake and dot-to-dot pages, and he’s been skipping merrily to school since.

My Big Boy has made the grade.

Tania McCartney