street roots
14
June 8 2012
On the edge of age six, a challenging persona arrives
out loud. Suffice to say that it wasn’t good
ay back when I was Very Pregnant
news. Kicked. In the stomach. Mr.
in the early summer of 2006, my
Discipline calmly informed me that Ramona
charming husband Marshall and I
spent the evenings dreaming of who the was to spend the rest of the afternoon in
the principal’s office while her injured
person we would soon be living with might
friend recovered in class, and that he’d be
be. We knew she’d be a girl. We knew, from
happy to discuss the kinds of conversations
her frequent calisthenics in utero that she’d
that I might productively have with my child
be energetic, even feisty. Beyond that, we
while she was spending the day at home
went between wishing and worrying as we
with me tomorrow. She was suspended.
talked and thought about what it would
Suspension in kindergarten? Really? Is
mean to be shepherding a brand new human
that even constitutional? I hung up shakily
through Life.
and began the long process of wondering
“I hope she likes sports,” said Marshall.
what thing I had done to ruin my child. Or
“I hope she digs literature,” said me.
things.
“Kids can be cruel. It’s going to suck
The car ride home from school was
when some kid is nasty to her,” said
especially long. If I had expected remorse
Marshall. I agreed. We came together on
from my bright-eyed little cherub, I’d been
hoping that she wouldn’t be bullied
wrong.
overmuch.
“She took the jump rope from me and
Fast-forward almost six years. Ramona is,
then I took it back and then she said she
in fact, energetic. She is also feisty. We were
was telling on me and I kicked her,”
right about those things. She has a fantastic
Ramona related calmly, as though knocking
1920s haircut I do myself with kitchen
the wind out of the child she’d assaulted had
shears. She smiles a lot, and waves at
been the only rational response to a
strangers, and asks phenomenally
grievous offense. Matter of fact. Cool and
interesting questions about the world and
calm. I flushed and was speechless, until I
says unexpected things like kids do and
wasn’t, and then I harangued at, reasoned
wows me by using words such as “narrator”
with, and finally pleaded to Ramona that she
and “actually” and “ambiguous.” She’s fun.
recognize that she’d hurt someone and that
And so far, her fellow kids have been pretty
it was very wrong.
rad to have around. Young Jascha, our
“But she was gonna tell on me!”
neighbor and Ro’s bestie since diapers now
Sigh. I could stomach her losing control
serenades her with “Twinkle, Twinkle Little
in a moment of anger, but that she had hurt
Star” on his miniature violin; young Charlie
someone and wasn’t even sorry made me
and her mom have Ramona over for snacks
question who she was, and whether I’d
and play when I teach a late class Mondays;
taken a wrong turn and was creating a
Charlie taught Ro to ride a bike with
monster.
training wheels in her much-better-cared-for-
We got home, I handed her to father,
than-ours backyard; gentle Laila invites Ro
who’d been briefed and wore a suitably
over to her place across the street for
serious expression, furrowed brow included,
coloring and impromptu picnics. No bullies
and locked myself in the bathroom to call
on scene. Except one.
At my desk grading midterms, I heard my my mom, who offered an odd flavor of
comfort.
cell phone chirp and hurriedly answered
“She’s going to be six in August. She’s
when I saw Ramona’s school’s number on
practically six. Six is another of the terrible
the screen. Was she sick? Did I forget to
ages that you hear less about than two.
pack lunch? Had she been abducted from
They’re little animals at six,” my mother
the playground? (We are a people who
pronounced sagely. “Think of it that way:
catastrophize. Hold the molehill. I’ll take
they’re not evil — they’re still half animal,
the mountain.)
half human. That whole empathy-moral-
“Ms. Favara, this is Mr. (Disciplinary
compass-remorse thing really only happens
Officer) calling from (Ramona’s School).
consistently later. Right now, you just have
Ramona and another child had an incident
to make them accountable — give them
today.”
unpleasant consequences. They get that.”
“Oh! Is she okay?!”
Sigh.
“Ramona is fine. But the child whom she
I half bought it. I know one incident
kicked in the stomach in the lavatory ...”
doesn’t make my kid a sociopath, but I can’t
I’ll omit here the expletive I actually said
W
Melissa Favara
Melissa Favara
teaches English in
Vancouver and lives
and writes in North
Portland, where she
parents Ramona, age
5, hosts a bi-monthly
reading series, and
counts her husband
and her city as the
two great loves o f her
life.
abide even this level of meanness. I decided
we’d start with concrete consequences of
the you-did-something-bad-so-no-movie-night-
plus-other-deprivations category and keep
talking, hoping to get to understanding and
something like empathy. It wasn’t as though
she’d always been so callous about other
kids’ feelings—only a week before, Jascha’s
bursting into tears over a slight injury had
inspired her to cry, too. She can feel for
others. She just doesn’t always — especially
when she’s also frustrated or afraid. In
those moments, maybe the lizard brain
takes over, the body kicks, and the mind is
compelled to defend
what one’s already
done. Or something.
“Part animal,” my
j COQld stomach her losing
mother repeated
control In a BIOBieBt of
regret what she did,
tllB t Sit© ItBCt Itt&f
but you can talk to the someone and wasn't even
human part of her,
s o r r y m a d e I»® Q u e s t i o n w fe o
ask her how she’d feel
w h e |h e r F d
if someone hurt her,
f
help that part to grow, t a f e e n a WTORCf IlSTO Bltll WBS
She’s still figuring out creating a monster»
how to express
herself, and
sometimes she’ll
express with her
hands and feet before she can put together
what to say. You can work on that.”
And so we are. During the day of
suspension, Ro had to write “I will not hurt
other children” 10 times. She didn’t get her
half-hour of approved video while I made
dinner for that night or the next few (file
under consequences). And I asked her what
she thought we could do to apologize to her
victim.
“If I got kicked, I’d feel better if I had a
cookie. We should make her cookies,” Ro
said, almost reflectively. File under empathy,
if a rudimentary form.
We’ve had a good week since then. Ro
hasn’t made a set of brass knuckles out of
Play-Doh or anything like that yet, and she
did make a nice card to go with the cookies.
It had a picture of a stick figure girl
frowning and holding up round fists and
another stick figure girl smiling and holding
a bouquet. She’d drawn an X through the
bully. Underneath was scrawled the word
“sorry.” Yet I doubt that we’ve seen the last
of Mean Girl: Ro may lose it and lash out
again, and we’ll have to work through it
again, and we will. Wish us luck.
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