Ever since I first learned of Clara's existence, I've lived in fear of myself putting too many expectations on her. Or just expecting her to be somebody she's not. I don't want to define in my head who she is, or who I think she should be. I want to discover who she is, along with her.
My experience working with kids and education classes emphasized not labeling children. So when those first labels began rolling in about Clara ("she's such a
serious baby!"), I cringed inside. I still do. And every once in awhile, I catch myself labeling her myself.
Now, this hang-up with labeling kids has nothing to do with any kind of rebellion against the way I was raised. Really, my parents were among the best I've ever met about letting us be who we were. Other people's parents would nag them about getting a boyfriend, while mine would sit back and say, "hey--it's your life." In essence, saying, "do it your way."
That's the way I want to raise my kids, too. However, the stars were misaligned when I was born. I'm a first-born Virgo and for a very, very long time I possessed so many of those type-A characteristics that define first-born Virgos. Slowly, I've fought them off. And I thought I had tamed the first-born Virgo curse.
Then I had a kid.
Before Clara was born, we'd sit around and wonder, "what will he/she look like?" We started to plan her out, like she was a made-to-order baby. "Let's hope she's got your eyes and my nose." (Mario has amazing eyes, and he's always complimented my nose.)
But what if she had MY eyes and HIS nose? Poor kid.
Beyond the physical description, I'd sit and wonder about her character. Back to my order form, I wanted her to have her father's endless confidence (minus the infrequent bouts of arrogance) combined with my drive to be a good student. So when those "she's so serious!" comments came rolling in, we took it in stride, as we were both very serious babies. She was right on track to be as practically perfect as ourselves. [Yes, my tongue is stuck WAY inside my cheek!]
However, yesterday, as we were walking to the park, I came across another sign that my made-to-order-baby form may not have been delivered properly. Clara was walking block after block like a trooper. Up ahead, we noticed a small dog sitting in the doorway of a corner store. As Clara is fascinated with puppies, I pointed the dog out to her.
She froze.
In Clara's mind, dogs are the best thing ever--from a distance. But on her own two feet, they are fearsome creatures indeed. Nevermind that this dog was simply sitting in the doorway and remained parked on his butt the entire time we walked past. He didn't bark. He barely glanced her way.
But she put the brakes on those little feet and we dragged her past the dog with her knees locked rigidly. I could just about hear the squeals from the soles of her shoes on the sidewalk, like in a cartoon.
A block later, there was a cat in front of another store. Clara is usually equally fascinated by cats as she is dogs. For months, she's been able to distinguish the difference between the two animals and tell us all about them. However, yesterday fear overtook reason and as soon as she spied the cat, she burst out with, "NO PUPPY! NO PUPPY!" and again refused to move.
*sigh*
I was hoping this would pass her by.
My mother is afraid of dogs. I'm afraid of dogs (petrified of them was a better way to describe it when I was young . . . fear is just not strong enough of a word). This is where I was hoping that Mario's innate confident genes would kick in. He's not afraid of anything.
But she's my daughter, too. Perhaps she's picked up on the way I jump when dogs bark at me when we take our frequent walks down the street. Maybe it's just hereditary. Either way, it's official.
She's more like me than I care to admit.
And maybe that's just why it's so easy to hold these expectations for our kids. It's not that we want them to be just like ourselves--it's more that we want our kids to be inherently different from ourselves.
