Tuesday, March 28, 2006

Not a Vessel; Not Clay


Julia lending a hand
Originally uploaded by Temmerling.
I don't know what to say about this picture. I don't know how to capture my complex emotions. She had been watching my dad and I work on mudding and taping the sheetrock for nearly an hour. But one wonders exactly how much a baby absorbs. No, not that, one knows that babies absorb anything. One wonders at how much a baby can apply of what they absorb. How much they can apply, and how quickly. After all, how many times have I held her on my lap and patiently enunciated "mama, mmmmmama, mmmmmaaammmmmma" over and over, trying to get her to say it back? And how many times has she said it, or even tried to say it? None. She just looks at me with an amused look on her face and babbles baby words that have nothing, phonetically, to do with the two syllables ma and ma.

And then she does something like this. She watches her Mama and Grandpa smear mud on a wall, and the moment we put a mud-covered knife in her hand she reaches out and smears the mud on the wall. She knew exactly what one was to do with mud and a knife. And she did it. Carefully, unself-consciously, not trying to be cute or looking around for approval. As if she thought we were really expecting her to do her share of the work. As if she were equal in abilities and responsibility for the house. As if this were just another thing we were expecting her to learn and master at this age.

She doesn't yet say Mama*, she doesn't yet roll over. But she drywalls.

How much more is she pulling in? How much more am I, all unconscious to it, teaching her?

Already, at this young age, I have no control over what she learns. Even over what she learns from me.

The moment I was given another life to guide and control for a time, was the moment I began to learn how little control I really have.

The moment I try to set up a silly little photo-op to showcase how cute my daughter is, is the moment she reminds me that she isn't a passive vessel with no volition over what information sticks with her and what she does with that information, but a thinking, rationing, evaluating human being, who chooses what she learns and when she exhibits that knowledge. She is not just instincts and impulses; she is capable of decisive action.

She is not clay; she is a partner.

Now if I can only keep that in mind when she looks at me blankly while I'm encouraging her to roll over or call me "Mama".

Posted by Trista @ 11:43 AM