Back to school: a mom's lessons
An employ in my company posted this article in our intranet blog. 看了後 有點心酸 作父母的牽掛 兒女難以理解 當初到台北上大學時 也是迫不及待要闖蕩世界 家與家人都拋在身後很遠很遠......
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You have a daughter. She is six years old. You take a snapshot to mark this milestone, posing her against the front door of your house. She wears a bright new back-to-school outfit, pristine sneakers, a snazzy backpack, and a shy, expectant smile as she stands at the threshold.
She is so ready, and you are so not.
Because this tiny human being (you can still twirl her around while she clings to your neck like a monkey) is going out into a very big world, armed with hope and a peanut butter sandwich. (No jelly. Ever.)
She is about to enter that teeming, exotic universe that she knows has been going on outside her room, her home, her neighborhood, all along. It is finally time. It is thrilling and exciting and scary, and much of what makes it so is that you won’t be there. You’re not allowed. You, it turns out, have been a warm-up act for the main event, Daughter vs. World, and you realize that you’ve been relegated to the invisible stool in the corner of the ring.
She can’t begin to know what is out there in that brave new world, all the wonderful and terrible things. But you know. Boy, do you know, which explains why you are quietly freaking out.
Yes, she’s going to learn how to write her name, and stories. She’ll find out that she’s good at drawing and math. She’ll make new friends. She’ll learn to read about that cat and his hat—and so many other things—all by herself.
But she’s also going to encounter cliques, and injustice, and people who enjoy informing you that there is no such thing as the Tooth Fairy. She will learn about pointless rules, report cards, and being the one not chosen (who says school doesn’t prepare people for real life?). She will skin her knees, suffer unrequited love, and learn what she got wrong–over and over again.
And every day, every experience will create a bigger, fuller world that she inhabits without you, a rich parallel life that you will not be part of. No longer will you have her all to yourself. You will have to learn to share—nicely.
After all, you’re the grownup. You know, rationally, that this is the way of the world, this is life, this is what being a parent is all about. But, you can’t help but moan silently to yourself—how did it happen so fast?
Today, that daughter in the photo is 18 years old. She wouldn’t be caught dead letting you twirl her around, and it would throw your back out anyway. Which would really be inconvenient when tomorrow the two of you board a plane to fly 2,000 miles to the new world she’s off to conquer, the small Midwestern college with the excellent writing program and the atrocious winters.
After you haul the oversized suitcases and all the stuff you bought the day before at Ikea and Target into her dorm room and arrange it all, and maybe meet a few of her dorm mates, it will be time to leave. But first you will insist on taking a photo of her, posed in front of the impressively neat dorm room that you know will shortly resemble the bedroom in your house that she left a complete disaster.
You will hug her goodbye for as long as you dare, remind her that umbrellas and green vegetables are her friends, resolve not to Skype her for at least three days—and, you strongly suspect, cry the entire three-hour drive back to the airport. She, you strongly suspect, will immediately and happily venture out to start connecting people to their Facebook profiles.
As when she was six, she will be excited and scared and thrilled, in no small part because you won’t be there. But this year, she’s on her own for dinner. She’ll have to apply her own Band-Aids, remember that the red flannel pajamas don’t go in the white load, and get herself up in time to make that 8 a.m. class.
But while you predict pink sheets and missed classes and too much pizza ahead, if there’s one thing you also know it’s that she’ll be OK. You have spent a dozen back-to-school seasons buying new shoes and not putting jelly on the sandwich and slowly, a bit more every year, letting go. You survived her childhood, and she survived you, and miraculously, you’re both OK. You’re more than OK.
On Tuesday, she will walk alone into her first college classroom, full of unfamiliar faces, and you will be back at work. From all appearances, you will be industriously catching up on email. Only you will know that your cubicle chair is actually perched in an invisible corner, rooting on your contender.
=========================================
You have a daughter. She is six years old. You take a snapshot to mark this milestone, posing her against the front door of your house. She wears a bright new back-to-school outfit, pristine sneakers, a snazzy backpack, and a shy, expectant smile as she stands at the threshold.
She is so ready, and you are so not.
Because this tiny human being (you can still twirl her around while she clings to your neck like a monkey) is going out into a very big world, armed with hope and a peanut butter sandwich. (No jelly. Ever.)
She is about to enter that teeming, exotic universe that she knows has been going on outside her room, her home, her neighborhood, all along. It is finally time. It is thrilling and exciting and scary, and much of what makes it so is that you won’t be there. You’re not allowed. You, it turns out, have been a warm-up act for the main event, Daughter vs. World, and you realize that you’ve been relegated to the invisible stool in the corner of the ring.
She can’t begin to know what is out there in that brave new world, all the wonderful and terrible things. But you know. Boy, do you know, which explains why you are quietly freaking out.
Yes, she’s going to learn how to write her name, and stories. She’ll find out that she’s good at drawing and math. She’ll make new friends. She’ll learn to read about that cat and his hat—and so many other things—all by herself.
But she’s also going to encounter cliques, and injustice, and people who enjoy informing you that there is no such thing as the Tooth Fairy. She will learn about pointless rules, report cards, and being the one not chosen (who says school doesn’t prepare people for real life?). She will skin her knees, suffer unrequited love, and learn what she got wrong–over and over again.
And every day, every experience will create a bigger, fuller world that she inhabits without you, a rich parallel life that you will not be part of. No longer will you have her all to yourself. You will have to learn to share—nicely.
After all, you’re the grownup. You know, rationally, that this is the way of the world, this is life, this is what being a parent is all about. But, you can’t help but moan silently to yourself—how did it happen so fast?
Today, that daughter in the photo is 18 years old. She wouldn’t be caught dead letting you twirl her around, and it would throw your back out anyway. Which would really be inconvenient when tomorrow the two of you board a plane to fly 2,000 miles to the new world she’s off to conquer, the small Midwestern college with the excellent writing program and the atrocious winters.
After you haul the oversized suitcases and all the stuff you bought the day before at Ikea and Target into her dorm room and arrange it all, and maybe meet a few of her dorm mates, it will be time to leave. But first you will insist on taking a photo of her, posed in front of the impressively neat dorm room that you know will shortly resemble the bedroom in your house that she left a complete disaster.
You will hug her goodbye for as long as you dare, remind her that umbrellas and green vegetables are her friends, resolve not to Skype her for at least three days—and, you strongly suspect, cry the entire three-hour drive back to the airport. She, you strongly suspect, will immediately and happily venture out to start connecting people to their Facebook profiles.
As when she was six, she will be excited and scared and thrilled, in no small part because you won’t be there. But this year, she’s on her own for dinner. She’ll have to apply her own Band-Aids, remember that the red flannel pajamas don’t go in the white load, and get herself up in time to make that 8 a.m. class.
But while you predict pink sheets and missed classes and too much pizza ahead, if there’s one thing you also know it’s that she’ll be OK. You have spent a dozen back-to-school seasons buying new shoes and not putting jelly on the sandwich and slowly, a bit more every year, letting go. You survived her childhood, and she survived you, and miraculously, you’re both OK. You’re more than OK.
On Tuesday, she will walk alone into her first college classroom, full of unfamiliar faces, and you will be back at work. From all appearances, you will be industriously catching up on email. Only you will know that your cubicle chair is actually perched in an invisible corner, rooting on your contender.
Labels: 生活
posted by Violinck 小提琴 at
3:53 PM
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