About Me

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Learning and trying to be kind and living my life as fully as I can stand it.

Thursday, May 21, 2015

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What makes us who we are? I think about this a lot and have since long before I was a parent.

I went to a truly magical nursery school. It was a place where exploration and fun were emphasized. We got to play and sing and swing and climb. I still have memories of being there, which is incredible to me because that was almost forty years ago. I think Sunset Cooperative Nursery School is part of the reason I feel safe being curious. Sunset also taught my parents a lot about parenting--several of those lessons I use myself.

I went to a Jesuit high school--a college prep in San Francisco that was an all-boys high school for many years before voting to allow girls. My dad taught there and still does. I'm still realizing how special the Jesuit approach to education is. I was taught that learning how to learn is important. I took classes in Ethics and learned how to make decisions not only based on who is right and who is wrong but on outcomes that benefit the most people, taking into account who will be hurt in the process. I was already a good writer before high school but St. Ignatius made me a better writer. I read many classic, wonderful books. I discussed ideas. I played sports in an environment where athletes got dressed up on game days and walked the halls with pride to represent their team. Teachers and counselors talked to me about college from day one of freshman year. We went on retreats and experienced silent contemplation, community, unconditional love.

I played soccer from the age of five to nineteen, and then again as an adult. My main coach Arthur, a tall, thin, dark black man from Trinidad trained us for almost ten years. He was exacting and intense. He loved soccer and emphasized the basics, drilled them into us for hours. Our team didn't score many goals but we held our own against and often beat teams that were much better than we were because we had such excellent ball skills. To this day I could probably step on a field and keep a ball close to my feet despite not having touched one in almost five years. I came home crying from practice many times. He yelled at us and he expected a lot. It was very hard and it was also very fun, sometimes at the same time. The friends I made on that team are still my friends.

I went to Catholic church most Sundays for many years--actually until competitive soccer started edging Mass off the schedule. Our church was a sanctuary church that took care of people immigrating from Central America, especially El Salvador, during the years of civil war. There was a babysitting room in the back, the Red Room, where I took care of other people's kids during Mass. I was baptized and received my First Communion.

I have a younger brother and sister.

I spent time on a farm in Vermont most summers.

My parents split up when I was in middle school.

I got diagnosed with infertility as a teenager.

I lived in Spain for a year and became fluent in Spanish.

So many things. So many decisions, made by my parents or by me, that created situations and experiences I carry with me now. Other things that just happened, with no preparation and no permission. All of these things go into making me who I am. But it is so much more than that--we are not just a sum of our parts.

Long before I had kids of my own I observed that people come into this world already with a self--even when they are teeny, tiny hour-old babies. I have looked newborn babies in the eye and gotten strong looks back--I see you and I am trying to figure you out, they say. I have worked at my old nursery school and seen the wide variety of skills to be found in a group of two-year-olds. One kid can ride a tricycle but can't talk, one knows the name of every parent that comes through the door, one can climb to the very top of the red tower. How much of that is taught and how much just is?

It is endlessly fascinating to me, thinking about this kind of thing. I think it is also one of the reasons people can get so intense about their parenting decisions--where your baby sleeps, what they eat, whether they drink bottles or nurse, blah and blah and thousands of decisions or capitulations that go into parenting. How we respond to tantrums, what activities they do, what kids we meet and play with. So much. As though we have control over who these people turn out to be. No one wants to get it wrong and no one really knows what will end up making a difference.

I have had such a rich life. My wish for my children is that they pay attention. That they notice the world and the people around them. That they feel safe being who they really are. That they realize what a gift and a challenge and a privilege it is to be alive, to be a person, to be figuring it out.  That gratitude is a part of their daily lives.




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