Kindergarten kompetition

So.

Time passes. D- is five now, no longer the toddler, and no longer in Parc Ex. New neighbourhood, older boy.

Older boy started school in September. Kindergarten. This week he came home with his first homework assignment. The teacher asked that each child learn one or two (not more, her note insisted) bits of information about spiders. If the child felt so inclined he could draw a picture.

I only noticed D-'s homework assignment as we were getting ready to leave the house on our way to school.

Right, I said, Let's get out the dictionary. I read the entry under 'spider' out loud to D- and then asked him if he wanted to make a drawing, he said no. Off we go, I said, heading for the door.

Noooo, D- said. It's not enough information, he said. What about pictures? He was starting to get worked up. He was close to tears.

What's the story? Well, it seems other little children had arrived with a whole plethora of information about spiders, with pictures printed from the internet, with glossy close-ups of arachnids hairy and wide-eyed.

And then it hit me, the overzealousness of over-involved competitive parents makes everyone have to work that much harder.

When I complained to a colleague at work, she told me of how when her daughter was in grade one and had to make a presentation, a classmate came with her own computer and made a power point presentation. Grade one!

In the end, D- made a drawing of a spider and a web. I wrote out a few facts about spiders (more than two but less than five). But I insisted that if one child said five or six things about spiders well, there wouldn't be anything left for the other children to say.

Lord help me.

After skating

After skating, we drove past a Caribbean restaurant that I love. Realizing there was little to eat at home, I pulled over and we went to get some roti and a mauby drink. Unfortunately it was closed. Across the street, was a smaller, less frequented restaurant: "Canadian and Caribbean cuisine". We walked into what on closer inspection was a bar. The patrons all stopped and stared. One old fellow called out, "you want the place next door." Next door was a laundromat, but a few doors down was a tiny restaurant, painted bright yellow and orange. In we went.

The menu was handwritten on a piece of paper. The waiter slash cook slash ambiance-maker was a young guy, with a thick Island accent. "How you doin', mon?" he asked D-. D- looked at him blankly then said, "I want some juice."

Some young men at the front of the restaurant seemed intent on watching all the cars that passed in the street while rifling through carrier bags that they had with them. When a police car slowed in front of the restaurant they got riled up and one started to yell, "What are you looking at? I want your badge number" at the police outside. He went out to discuss this with them. D- tried the fish. I drank my soda.

A lady came in and started to sing loudly. She had nice hair and staring eyes. I suspected mental health problems. She shimmied to the back of the restaurant while the waiter cooked a chicken roti for a gentleman who held a whispered conversation with his phone. When the waiter came back out he asked Wild Eyes to make a salad for potential patrons. It took a while for her to understand. "You gonna make me a salad?" she asked. "Who is the salad for?" she asked. Finally, she opened the cold storage and started to fiddle about.

The waiter-cook, with no more orders to fill, sat at one of the tables. "Why is he sitting down?" D- asked. The waiter brought him some more plantain and again attempted conversation. "You enjoying it, mon?" "Thank you," said D-.

The street-watching boys went on their way. Wild Eyes went into the kitchen to make the salad. We finished out dinner and I left a hefty tip. Fish plate with two drinks: 12$. Island ambiance in the middle of Montreal: priceless.

Fail

D- didn't into the gifted school. Over two hundred and fifty kids apply to get into the kindergarten class each year. Twenty are accepted.

I didn't really expect him to get in, but for one gleaming moment, I did. That moment of hope made the letter of rejection that much harder to read.

It happened like this:

We went to the initial test one Sunday morning in November. D- was in the second group of children being evaluated that day. The principal, in a suit, told us how the testing would proceed. The children would be called by name and would gather in groups of eight to be evaluated by smiling young women with clipboards. The parents could watch a video. The principal spent some time setting up the video on his laptop, giving us a glimpse into his home life, two smiling girls sitting on a lawn in appropriate dresses.

D-'s name wasn't called. My anxiety levels rose. Eventually he was added to a group and taken off by the stereotypical big-bummed secretary. I watched the video. But I also watched the other parents. Who were these people who thought their kids were so smart?

D- came back, cagey about what the test consisted of. "Did they ask you math questions?" No. "Was it hard?" No. We went home and I told my friends and family that it had been a waste, his name not even properly on the list.

Then, the hope. A month later, we received a letter saying D- had been invited back for a second test. It seems that of the 250 who apply, 28 are called back and 20 (20!) are later selected for the kindergarten. The first test, an IQ test, eliminates the majority. The second test, a sociability test, eliminates the few.

My son had made it past the first test, leaving other kids in the dust. His father and I danced hubristically, envisioning a streamlined career towards space travel or medicine or groundbreaking science. We gloated about the genius of our son.

On a snowy day in January, we returned to the school. We crowded into the lobby with other parents, many of whom looked as surprised as we did, and well-dressed children, milling about asking each other questions. We left D- in the classroom and went to breakfast to celebrate. Victory was at hand. Did you see those other children? Fools, all of them! We drank coffee and rubbed our hands together with glee. When we picked up D- he misbehaved, running in circles in the gymnasium, climbing on the benches. I could feel the eyes of the other parents, their children docilely accepting coats and hats, while D- rolled on the floor in glee.

It's a shoe-in, we thought. We told our friends and family. They claimed to have recognized D-'s genius from an early age.

Then came the letter. On a bloody wait-list.

And I realized that much of my hope had not been about D-, but about my desire to be the recognized parent of a gifted child. That my disappointment was about my own insecurities and not so much about D-. When I read the letter, all I could think about were the other parents, who had watched as D- ran around the school, releasing his pent-up energy, how I would not be able to vindicate the judgment I had sensed in their eyes by showing up on the first day of school and yelling, "A-HA!"

I never thought I would be this parent. I am so glad D- thought it was all a game.

Fucking fours

They warned my about the 'terrible twos' but nobody said a peep about the 'fucking fours' (as a mama friend recently called them). Ah well, friends, I am here to let you know, the fucking fours are no walk in the park. Perhaps a chase in the park is a more accurate description, a chase involving a seemingly deaf four-year-old and a frantic parent, yelling at the oblivious child to stop.

Four years old.

The pros:

Amazing self confidence: D- thinks he's great. "I'm great," he says. Eavesdropping on a recent play-date with a friend from daycare, I couldn't help but notice that the boys' conversations revolved around one-upmanship, who was the fastest runner, the strongest, had the most toys, the most cars, the most super hero skills.

Complete sociability: D- talks to anyone and everyone. He shows off his artwork on the bus. He proudly tells tellers, shop assistants and strangers in the street his name and age. He then pauses, waiting for whatever praise or applause may follow. In a restaurant last night, when D- had tired of his table mates' company, he walked over to the bar, plonked himself on a bar stool and started to chat up the only other patron, a large black man with dreads. They were close friends by the end of the evening. I wouldn't be surprised if they exchanged numbers (luckily, D- does not know his phone number yet).

A mind that is fast, fast, fast: D- does double digit math in his head. He remembers what we did two summers ago, he does puzzles that stump me.

A body that goes zoom!: Running, jumping, hopping, rolling, skating, sliding, climbing. Faster, higher, longer, harder. He jumps off the diving board of the pool (albeit with a foam-stuffed bathing suit), he climbs rocks and bookshelves (wait, wait, that's in the cons).

The cons:

Attitude!: When a boy thinks he is the best and can do no wrong, it is sometimes a challenge to contradict him, and when you do, oooh, get ready for some attitude. Typical conversation: "D-, put on your boots, it's raining outside." "No, it's not!" "What do you mean? It's raining outside. Look out the window." "Nooo." "D- put on your boots." "It's not raining, mommy." "D-, I am counting to three, put on your boots." We get outside, it is raining, but only mildly. "See mommy, you were wrong, it's not raining." "D-, we are not going to have this conversation."

Hear no mummy, see no mummy: Being the self confident little man that he is, D- thinks he is ready to make all decisions himself, this leads to running across the street, in the dark, while his mother screams from the sidewalk. This means putting on his shoes, going outside and climbing the fence to the backyard, without telling anyone! Running across the street! Going outside alone! I used to be able to control these behaviours with a sharp "D-!" but not anymore, now he just keeps on running.

And my heart keeps on leaping up into my throat.

I hope fives are a little less CRAZY.

Black head

Fall is here. The mornings are cool and crisp. The afternoons bright, blue skyed warmth. Thoughts turn to wool sweaters, apple picking, falling leaves. In this spirit of fall renewal, I decided to henna my hair a mild chestnut brown, to tame down the harsh blonde highlights that I had put in over the summer. I picked up a package of henna at the local grocery store and then it sat on the back of my toilet for several weeks. It never seemed the right time to dye my hair; too late, too early, too tired, too distracted. With a lazy afternoon ahead of me (well, actually, I should be tidying the apartment but who wants to clean) I decided to dye my hair.

Henna has a long use in my family. I have hennaed my hair about every colour, and have fond memories of my mother with a plastic bag on her head, green goo sliding down her neck as she renewed the red that was hers for years.

I emptied the green powder into an enamel bowl, added water and put on plastic gloves. It felt like an old ritual. As the henna dried on my head, I read a travel book by Paul Theroux. When I rinsed off my hair, I got a surprise. My hair, normally a medium brown, is now pitch black. Not mild, chestnutty black, if such a thing exists, but teen-angst, goth black; pasty-skinned, belly-exposing black; cheap black. Ugly black.

Shit.

And it will look horrid growing out, that black tips with brown roots look that girls working the cash at the pharmacy seem to favour.

I did not want black hair. I do not like black hair. I do not have the eyebrows to support black hair. When I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror (and there have been many such glimpses as I vainly hope that in drying it won't be so very... black) I am struck at how horrid I look.

And there is nothing I can do about it. As I often say to my son when he wants something he can't have, tough bananas. I am stuck with it.

And there is something marvelously hysterical about being stuck with black hair, like being obliged to wear that hand knit reindeer sweater for months on end but not being able to wear it ironically. I have horrible black hair. This is a lesson of letting go, of letting go of ideas of myself, of how I must present myself to the world.

Which doesn't mean my hair won't be ponytailed for the next few months. Or under a hat.

Saturday in the park

It is one of the last days of summer. Sharp, cool mornings turn into hot days. Hurricane Irene is making her way up the coast. Soon, it'll be wet and even colder. Goodbye summer. Hello fall.

With a lazy day stretching out in front of me, I decided to go to the library and get some comics. I prefer the term comics to graphic novels. But the term I really like is BD because it is in France and with French friends that my love for comics really got its start. I used to read them a lot. Not the sci-fi-fantasy-sex-pot-violence ones, nor the mangas, but the sullen, ironic and silly ones. There is a scene in Lapinot that made me cry for the hilarity of it. It has a dog saying "whiff" and a cat, named Richard (Riri to his friends) saying, "tout doux". There is an amazing Swiss comic called "Priapus" based on the Greek myth about the boy with a huge penis. It has no words. It is amazing. I remember reading it in the park and being stunned by the artist's ability to convey his story through images (and no, it is not all dicks). Don't even get me started on David B or the Isaac le Pirate series.

It was with these thoughts in my head that I wandered over to the Bande dessinee section of the library (it had been so long since I had taken out comics that I stood blankly in front of the Large Text section before figuring out that BD was now where Foreign Languages used to be). I got three comics, one about life in Israel, one about a man with Alzheimer's and one about a depressed French guy (the last being a very popular theme in comics).

With my books in hand I went to the park and sat down next to a tree across from the baseball diamond. There was a baseball game on and participants and spectators had set up a barbecue. After a few minutes, I realized it was a deaf tournament and I had a frisson of voyeuristic glee before forcing myself to return my attention to Exit Wounds (the Israeli one). A baby cried and I thought, "Who will hear her?"

I opened the first page and noticed someone standing to my right. A tall man, in coke-bottle glasses and a black, sleeveless shirt. "Trouvez-vous quarante et seule?" he asked me. "Quoi?" I responded not quite sure I had heard correctly. He repeated his question. I puffed with indignation (readers of this blog will know that I do like a good indignant puff). "Je ne suis pas quarante ans," I said offendedly. He persisted in wanting to know if I was alone and I told him to piss off.

Really.

Exit Wounds was interesting, I couldn't get through the depressed French one, and I am saving the Alzheimer's one for another day.

Long live summer.

Hammer in the morning

My odd attempts at freelance journalism have often been fueled by interests I have or irritants that make me want to share my griping with a wider audience. I thought I had found the perfect story when one sunny, summer morning, I was awakened by the sound of jackhammers outside my window. Indignant, I peered out to see city workers digging up my sidewalk. Upon closer inspection, it seemed my corner of Parc-Ex was getting a make-over, complete with large orange signs, bulldozers, and sunglassed construction workers smoking cigarettes and texting as they leaned on a wall. I felt there was surely a story here. Why else would I be awoken so early in the morning? I called the city and tried to ask intelligent questions but ended up blurting out, "But why replace perfectly good sidewalks with new ones? And why before 7 am in the summer?" The answers were perfectly reasonable (replacement of sewer tops, verification of water mains, etc) and my ire fizzled to a coal glow of jackhammer headache. Then the work was done, the only reminder was the checkerboard appearance of the new sidewalk squares interspersed with the old. Until. Until this morning when the jackhammers started up again, the lounging city workers reappeared and the street in front of my house was ripped up.

It is just the section of street in front of my house that is getting the overhaul. One wonders if my call to City Hall got the ball rolling, as it were. I do recall saying, "It's not the sidewalks that need replacing, it's the streets." Perhaps they took my advice and are now replacing the streets, one bone-jittering section at a time.

In the meantime, I need to get away from my house.