Penguin Love
P racticing viola with Xander yesterday, he got frustrated with the same brush-y bow stroke he’s been working on for weeks now. I understand the frustration but need him to keep practicing anyway, and I try to speak lovingly of how when he practices he works through problems, but I catch this sort of trying to cheer himself up, asking “So am I learning faster than other kids my age?” which may be the cry of a child who has a brother two years older that he feels he will never catch up with, has a younger brother whose every accomplishment is fussed over and praised. I think of how he was visibly aching Sunday morning when he and Aodán both played with a group for some friends and there was voluble praise for Aodán’s playing and I had to pull him aside and say “When someone compliments Aodán they aren’t insulting you.” But I don’t know.
So I ask him if it’s important to him to be doing better than other kids his age and he tells me how he had cried that morning at getting a C on a math test and then had to remind himself that this was an algebra test and other third graders are working on learning their multiplication tables. And I feel like I am getting a C on some sort of parenting test. Because I really, truly believe that what matters is doing your own best and not how you’re doing in comparison with others, but I see that as being one of those almost taboo double-speak things in our society, where people say that and then compare you. In my heart of hearts, I know I am enjoying the reflected glory of my children’s quick learning. And I have a horror that I am more complicit than I admit to myself, too, compare the boys to each other or make them feel like how much love they’re going to get depends on how they achieve, how they make me proud. I remember childhood’s need for attention, for making the adults in my life proud, I wonder if it is possible to not pass this along.
But here is my secret hope. In the movie March of the Penguins, all the mother penguins arrive back at the nesting grounds where the baby penguins have hatched under their father’s care during the mothers’ absence, and the mothers identify their own babies by their unique songs. It isn’t that a baby has to have the loudest song, or the most beautiful song, or the most accurate pitch, it’s that the song is uniquely their own that makes them identifiable. I want my kids to feel loved that way, like I treasure each of their songs not because I compare it with the other baby penguins, but because it is his own.
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yes, isn’t that the hardest thing ever? because no matter how much you treasure their OWN songs, they’re busy comparing with the other little chicks.
but at least the struggle will be beautifully written. lovely post!
This is a lovely post.
I had to go back to the second paragraph about 10 times, though, because after reading the first one, all I could think about was how I wanted to do something nice for Xander. My co-dependent “fix-it” button got pushed, or maybe it’s that I can commiserate so well with what it feels like to be the younger sibling of two spectacular human beings. Once I told my brain to shut-up, though and listen to what you were saying, it was so clear to me that nothing about Xander needs to be “fixed”. It is tough having an older sibling who is brilliant, no matter how brilliant you are yourself, but Xander is lucky enough to have a mom who recognizes and treasures his unique song, and that’s a pretty amazing gift.
and really. Algebra? in third grade?
That Xander CAN remind himself of that? is your profound gift to him.
Please tell him from me that the Brujo’s 9th grade algebra students can’t make change. SRSLY. “If you have $3 and I take $1.50, what do you have left?” “Um, $2.50?”
And when I was an aunt, Rohan even at the age of 3 would say stuff sadly like, “I’m not smart like Yishi.” Because Rishi was 5 and could already count and spell. What a horrific anxiety of influence, which just makes me selfishly glad I was an only child. Though on the other hand it’s a bit of a big-fish-in-a-you-sized-pond situation, and there are cruel realities on the other end of it, esp. when your mom didn’t teach you to remind yourself but instead grounded you and bought you a calculator.
Oh: http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/04/25/twitter.buck/index.html
!!! So you never know, you see….
And she crawls grumpily back to the bed, which is a nest of papers.
beautiful post aside, how do mama penguins identify unique sounds from babies they have never met? biology is so weird.
Yeah, that *is* a great post… Just catching up now with Mara’s recent ones.
I’m sorry to hear about Xander’s predicament, but he is an absolutely unprecedented human being. I’ve heard several people in the family say “I’ve never met anyone like Xander in my entire life.” I don’t know how mother penguins do it, but I think most any human, even an unrelated one, can hear his unique song.
On top of algebra, he is an *incredible* actor, or was the last time I saw him at work. Those ninja poses were almost Shakespearean.