Dec 20, 2006 | Boy Wonder
Poor Boy Wonder… he can’t catch a break on his hair. Lately, more and more people have been referring to him in the feminine. It’s become a race between the two of us as to which of us can say “Boy!” first after another mistaken identity. Recently, we were in Danish Made sneaking a much earned treat after a grueling shopping trip to JoAnne’s (Have any of you Astorians been in JoAnne’s lately? MOBBED! Somebody sprinkled crafting dust on the population of our small town and every one of us was down there fighting over the grosgrain ribbon!). We were greeted with, “How are you ladies. . .” and we both shouted, “BOY!” before she could finish. Just for the record, those donuts at Danish Made are the bomb! But you didn’t hear it from me.
A year ago Boy Wonder decided he wanted to grow his spiffy short haircut out a bit. But I don’t think he ever meant to look this cherubic. It’s not his fault either. Sadly, both of his parents have been preoccupied with so much work that the whole beauty maintenance routines have been put on perma-hold. I’ve not had a haircut since June…but I’m also not a nine year old boy. To make matters worse, when his bangs get too long and begin to really frustrate him, I haul out my hair scissors and whack away. The result being his cute mopish haircut of last summer is taking on a distinct page-boy shape. Despite the name, page-boys are not masculine.
We are used to people thinking he looks like a girl—it’s been that way since the beginning. No amount of blue baby clothes then, or death-rocker sweatshirts now can convince people that those sweet cheeks belong to a boy. I’ve actually had people say, “But, he’s too pretty to be a boy!” When I look at him, I don’t get it. Because I see my kid for who he is, which is so much more than his gender. Fortunately, he seems to have a good sense of self and finds the confusion funny. However, his hair was getting too long even for him. Like most people in my family, our hair tends to do this cute little flip when it gets to a certain length… and for Boy Wonder it was just too much!
But it was Santa who finally got this kid’s parents motivated. Our local fire department does a food collection each year, where they outfit their rigs with lights and parade through the neighborhoods gathering up canned goods. This year, as the truck with Santa passed by our house Santa looked down and said, “Merry Christmas, little girl!” All three of us nearly hit the pavement for laughing.
Me: “So, you think it might be time to get a haircut, huh?”
Boy Wonder: “You think? Mom, it’s bad if even Santa can’t tell I’m a boy!”
IZ: “So much for Santa being omniscient! I’ll make the phone call tomorrow.”
That was a week ago. Yesterday, it was finally time for our appointments. All three of us filed in to submit our overgrown locks to the mastery of Kimberly. (Who also rocks, if you need a good haircut at a decent price! She’s amazing!) We arrived as overgrown shaggy messes and departed reborn, as boys! Ok, well—one of us did.
After his cut he looked at me with his trademarked twinkle and said, “I’m so keeping this haircut.” That’s 10 year old code for, “Don’t make me hurt you to get another appointment in a month.”
Dec 19, 2006 | Boy Wonder, This Life
So… remember Grim? Well, it turns out that Grim has issues with learning his multiplication tables. He has about half of them down cold–interestingly enough, what is memorized is intermittent. So, parts of table 4 and parts of table 6 etc… he gets and other parts he “just can’t memorize, it’s too hard!” In fact, the very suggestion that memorization is a key to his success in mathematics leads to full out melt-downs. “There are just so many. . . I will never be able to remember them all!”
What’s a mother to do? In my case, not much, since I’m not the Math and Science teacher around here. No, that job falls to poor IZ. However, it does typically mean that I wake up most Tuesdays and Thursdays to high drama in my house. I don’t like high drama. Period.
IZ likes to blame this on Boy Wonder’s second grade teacher. Mrs. Glassman believed in a more creative approach to math. If you didn’t know the answer to a simple problem in her class, why you could just create your own strategy, your own work around to solve the problem. No need for memorizing those pesky math facts, you could create an answer! Just look for a pattern and when you find it, replicate! A year of this and my pattern obsessed kid was hooked. An addict to the pernicious “work-around.” He’s never gotten clean.
Now IZ is straight from 1951, even if he was born two decades later. And while I tend to be the least linear person in these parts, I do agree with him in this matter. There are just some things, basic things, you need to learn and that means memorization! And what irks IZ more than anything, is not just that Boy Wonder seems completely committed to the fine art of the work-around; it’s that he has elevated it to high art in the first place. The simplicity and beauty, the very eloquence of mathematics is rendered muddied in the abstract permutations Boy Wonder seems dedicated to produce. This creates a sort of number anger that is both volatile and contagious. More often than not I wake up to IZ and Boy Wonder in heated debate at best and full-out warfare at worst.
Today was no exception. I call them “my dog with a bone and my puppy with a bone” for a reason. And the bone they most typically like to fight over is the efficacy of mathematics. People, let me just say here and now, I don’t like mathematics in the first place, I certainly can’t tolerate high drama around it before I’ve had my coffee! Having had enough, I decided to interfere. But instead of my typical, “Why can’t we all just get along? And where’s my coffee?” lament, I opted for a different tack.
I began by trying to convince my child the importance for learning the basics… that creating his own language for his work would make it really difficult in the future to communicate with other mathematicians. Yes, that’s right… I used a language analogy—I’m the English teacher after all. He just looked at me. “Yes, but, I have a better way! It makes more sense to me!” Perhaps… but I’m guessing that all his future college peers are going to feel exactly like IZ, not exactly sympathetic to his antics. Then, it hit me…
Unlike IZ, I don’t blame this on Mrs. Glassman. I think she gave my child a great advantage for his future. She awakened in him his deep desire to be an inventor and it will serve him well… if only he will accept that there are some things he’s going to have to learn old school. No, I fault something far more more insidious.
“Listen,” I begin,“I blame this on Star Trek! You watch that B’Lanna Torres (OMG, I know their NAMES) create work-arounds every time the Starship Voyager gets in trouble! Right?” He nods his head. The tears in his eyes are quickly evaporating and there is a new gleam in them… he’s hooked! Who knew Star Trek would come in so handy?
“Well, it’s like this,” I continue, “When B’Lanna creates a work-around she is still using the basic principles of engineering, she is just doing it in a creative way. She couldn’t do that if she didn’t know the basic rules. In fact, if she didn’t understand, let’s say the Warp Core so well, she couldn’t find new ways of fixing it… Right?”
At this point, let’s just say I’m freakin’ pleased with myself. I have NO idea what I’m saying, but some how, it’s getting through.”
“So, your multiplication tables, are like the Warp Core. They are the essential power behind making the starship fly. . . without it, you are just in dead space. Now, what you’ve been doing is something like having Voyager flying along just fine and B’Lanna deciding to do some experimenting with the Warp Core!” Oh the horror. He looks at me like I have to be kidding, because B’Lanna would never do that!
I continue, “You can imagine how upset Captain Janeway is going to be when her ship grinds to a halt because B’Lanna got a hankering to be creative!” Lots of nods. . . “In fact, Captain Janeway would probably take away B’Lanna’s replicator rations.” That would be bad, we both agree.
And with that, Grim disappeared. We agreed to work on learning his Warp Core basics at night together before bed. Flash cards may be old school, but they are effective! Misery does love company, after all.
I’m no fool. My kid is always going to be looking for the angle. He’s just wired to find new and interesting ways of seeing the world. This is a good thing. But learning the basics of any system is also a good thing. We have to understand the rules we are breaking to fully appreciate the beauty of doing so. Otherwise, we’re only running on intuition and intuition can take us just so far in the world before we bump into reality that the Warp Core basics we found so boring are completely necessary to saving the day. It’s true in writing, in science, in math, and in Space. And if you don’t believe me, you just need to ask my new best friend, B’Lanna Torres.
Dec 13, 2006 | Boy Wonder
See this little kid? Yeah, he doesn’t live here any more. Gone are the spontaneous hugs and scribbled hearts in crayon on my walls. Gone are lovely little expressions of gratitude and merriment. No more singing in the back seat of the car. No more dancing in the aisles of the store. This brooding boy now grunts his way through his day…and that’s when we’re lucky! Our bright, happy child has been snatched in the night and in his place is a very, very moody 10 year old. We never know from moment to moment: will it be the happy Boy Wonder or will it be his Evil Twin, Grim.
So, when the morning rolls around and IZ instant messages me, “Hey, is Boy Wonder awake” you can imagine my dread. He’s quiet. That’s good. He’s not making any noise at all… he’s either still asleep, as moody children are wont to do, or he’s avoiding schoolwork. It’s not any surprise when I message back, “Um, I’m not waking him up… YOU go do it.” If Evil Twin, Grim emerges from his room, I don’t want to be the one who faces him before coffee!
Evil Twin, Grim is cranky. He spits out his words with no amount of respect. Pointing out to him that consequences for his behavior are of his own making causes one to fear breathing wrong. His eyes narrow and boring holes into your soul he snaps, “You. Have. Offended. Me!” Heaven forbid. In a moment he’s angry, in the next he is a bundle of tears. (And, if you even hint to him that I told you any of this, I will deny ever knowing you.) I don’t remember signing up for Evil Twin, Grim. You can imagine why, lately, Chez Wonder hasn’t been such a wonderful place to live!
Now, there is a certain amount of attitude I’m willing to ignore. He is no doubt growing and suffering the awful side effects of hormone rushes. There is a requisite amount of door slamming and stair stomping to be expected. But, honestly—I’m not liking Grim all too much. Because, while I get his angst (premature, in my opinion) and his complete meltdowns and his bouts of irrational thought, not to mention the over abuse of words in my direction, what I’m missing is his sense of humor. He’s never been overly adept at laughing at himself while in the midst of drama—that’s to be expected at his age. But when the humor of everyday life is missing… then, you get a wee bit homesick for that quirky kid who used to wear your flip-flops with socks and groove to his own little beat. Where is that kid?
And then. Then he has his moments. He surprises you by paying attention. By being ever so thoughtful. By trying really hard to be pleasant. Yet, the specter of Grim’s eventual arrival lurks on the edges. That’s when you hear loud thumping on the stairs, the door slam open (yes, that’s possible) and he unceremoniously thrusts these into your hands:
“Here,” he grunts. “I was going to give these to you for Christmas, but, well here you go!” And you are taken aback that at 10 he knew the only thing you wanted for Christmas was a few handmade houses to begin a village of your own.
In your hands are little houses of wonder. And you remember that this, in all its brooding grimness and all its delightful wonder, this is exactly who you signed up to love.
Nov 29, 2006 | Boy Wonder
See this kid?
Yeah, he’s mine. He’s nearly 10 and that beret he has on… it belongs to me. This is a problem I should not be facing considering his gender. Heck, I was kinda counting on stealing his clothes in the future.
This all started yesterday when I loaned him, loaned him that beret to go outside because he couldn’t locate his own hat fast enough and was worried his snow would melt away before he found it. That and it was freakin’ early in the morning, I’d not had my coffee yet, so I wasn’t exactly amenable to looking for his hat. I grabbed mine and said, “Here.”
“Will this make me look like a girl?” He asked standing in front of the hallway mirror.
“Um, you always look like a girl.” (Hey, I’d not had my coffee yet, cut a girl some slack)
“Yeah, I know, but does it REALLY make me look like a girl?”
I surveyed my son and told him truthfully, “Yeah, pretty much.”
“That’s ok,” he grins, “I’m the only kid out there right now and I know I’m a boy. And you always say that!”
“What do you expect with hair that long. You gonna cut your hair?”
“Nope!” and out he went to move mountains of snow. Ok, inches of snow. Work with me here, people.
So, this afternoon rolls around and there is still snow. He still can’t find his hat, and as he dons mine he gives me that grin. I swear, he enjoys messing with people.
“That hat looks good on you, kiddo, ” I start.
“Yeah! I think so too. So, you gonna donate it to me?” His grin is getting wide now.
“Well, you do look pretty cool in it.”
“I KNOW! But are you going to donate it to me?” Presses my future Goodwill employee of the month.
“Hmm… I don’t know. That’s my beret.”
“Yeah, but you have your red one. The one dad bought you. You don’t need this one too!”
“You’re really digging that hat, aren’t you?”
“Uh-huh, so, can I have it?” At this point the grin is a mile wide and he’s resorted to batting his long eyelashes at me. Yeah, way to go boy, steal my clothes and rub in the fact you have better lashes than me.
“Let’s just say I reserve the right to wear it when I want to–but sure, you can keep it for now.”
And off he went. I’m so not ready for this.
Nov 1, 2006 | Boy Wonder
Ahem… I’ve been asked to help promote a certain blog that is related to me by authorship. That is, my kid writes it. So–go check out Geiodo and say “hi”. He’s kinda lonely for readers and I promised I’d send a few his way. Thanks in advance!
Oct 26, 2006 | Boy Wonder
Boy Wonder: Um… don’t forget I lost a tooth.
Oh yeah, the jig is up. He knows. And he knows that I know he knows. But we are still playing at this game. We’ve decided that this makes life interesting.
Me: OK!
Boy Wonder: I’m putting my tooth under my pillow. OK?
Me: Um, put it by your computer. (his bed is under an alcove which makes it hard to climb in and make the switch without waking him.)
Boy Wonder: No, I’m putting it under my pillow.
Me: OH COME ON! Make this easy for the tooth fairy.
Boy Wonder: NO! The tooth fairy does this hundreds of times each night for hundreds of kids and it’s going to do it for me too.
Me: FINE. BE. A. BUTT. Sheesh…
Rapid fire giggles ensue. Then I hear shuffling, a door open, and feet stomping back into bed. When I go check on him later to convince him that only he is enjoying the sound of his voice at the moment, I notice that he has his door propped open with a K’nex.
Me: (Holding the toy) Um, I’m not an idiot, you know. I’m never falling for THAT!
Boy Wonder: (snorting) Oh, that wasn’t for the tooth, er you… that was for the dog. Yeah, so the dog can get into the room.
Me: Uh huh… GO. TO. SLEEP.
Later tonight, I will sneak into his room and try to evade the trap I’m sure he has set up for me. If he wakes, I will suggest to him that he really needs to go to the bathroom and because he’s ever so compliant in that state, I’ll make the swap then. Technically, that’s not lying because he will need to go by then. The lying will come tomorrow when he gives me that sly look and says, “Hey, wanna see what the tooth fairy brought me? It’s a Popular Science Magazine and Sponge Bob Comic!” It’s a look that will imply that he knows the tooth fairy is me. I will look back and grin–because all the while he’s thinking I’m the tooth fairy, I’ll be thinking, “Oh come on, Popular Science? That had to be your dad!”
