Sharing is Caring

There is something irresistibly magnetic about the playground outside Sophie’s preschool.  It’s not just Sophie.  I can hear each child as they cross the threshold out into parking lot, begging, “Can I pleeeeese go on the playground?  Just for eight minutes?”

They have learned to ask for small and unusual amounts of time, the way the homeless might ask you for 13 cents, so you wind up giving a dollar. 

I am weak.  Each day I give the dollar when I go to pick her up.  

Sophie knows all the angles:

“But look!  [Insert name of her best-friend-of-the day] is there!  Oh pleeeeeese?”

“Everyone else is on the playground, why can’t I go?”

“I barely got any time on the monkey bars today.”

Etc. 

I really really try not to operate from a place of guilt.  But sometimes, okay most days, I fail.  Only the rain deters us. 

We pass through the clanging metal gate, Sophie bolts to join her friends and I join the other parents who have been suckered into their 8 minutes on the playground.  We stand there sweating, in heels and sweaters that kept us warm in our air-conditioned offices that afternoon. 

Sophie is swinging from the money bars, “Watch this!” she calls skipping to every other bar, her tiny tan biceps popping out all over the place.  I watch.  “Watch this!” she calls again, as she does each time she makes another pass over the bars, “This time gripping the long bars on the outsides, shifting inch-by-inch, her legs swinging madly from side to side, like a pendulum.  I watch.  Sophie and her friends have discovered a thousand ways to traverse this flat metal ladder.  Their hands are calloused.  Their bodies are wiry and compact—the envy of even the fittest among us, who run miles and miles each week and still cannot attain what they do in pleasure and play. 

Another child hops onto the monkey bars on the opposite side. 

At this stage, I prefer to let Sophie handle the majority of her own playground negotiations.  But, with other parents around, I feel a particular obligation to make sure that Sophie is taking turns, and not bogarting the monkey bars, as she is wont to do. 

“Let, Anastasia have a turn,” I tell Sophie. 

“Okay, Mom,” she said, swings across two bars (To defy me?  To taunt Anastasia?  Because she wants to?) and hops down. 

“Can I have my snack?”

I pull out the handful of goldfish she has persuaded me to bring out onto the playground.  Instantly Anastasia is at her side.

“Sophie?” she says with the lisp of a younger child, “can I have some?”

Sophie crinkles the bag and pulls it closer to her.

“Sophie,” I warn, “ask her mother if it is okay, and if so, share a few with Anastasia.”

“No.  It’s my snack.”  Begin scene.

“It is not nice to be eating in front of someone and keeping it all to yourself.  You can spare a few.”

“It’s okay,” the other mother says, “we’re about to go have dinner.”  She is trying to smooth things over.  But I have asked Sophie to do this thing and she is unyielding, so now I’ve dug my heels in too.

“She can share a couple,” I say.

Meanwhile, Sophie is scarfing down as many gold fish as she possibly can.  Her mouth is full, and slivers of orange cracker, shoot through the air as she announces, “I’m almost done.”

“Give her one. NOW.”  I am using my I-Mean-Business voice. 

Sophie ceremoniously takes a bite of her second-to-last goldfish and hands Anastasia the other half.

“Sophie!  That’s not what I meant!”  Now I’m pissed.

“What?  I’m sharing like you said mom.”

“That is not sharing.  No one wants a half-eaten goldfish straight from your mouth.”

And as I am uttering these words, she takes the very last goldfish and pops it into her glutted maw. 

“Okay, Soph.  Since you can’t be generous with your friend, I’m not feeling terribly generous myself.  It’s time to go home.”

“NO! “

“Yep.  It’s time.” 

“I did share!  You saw me share!”

I am hearing the words “disengage” in my head, but it’s overridden my need to teach this kid a lesson.

“That was not sharing.  How would you like it if you asked to share a snack with me, I took a bite out of it any only gave you an itty-bitty piece.”

“But it was MINE!” Sophia wailed. 

Platitudes are one of several educational strategies Sophie’s school employs to foster emotional intelligence.  “Sharing is caring,” is one such saying that is drilled into the children by their teachers.  At home, during play dates, I hear it tossed back and forth between Sophie and her preschool pals as a weapon.  It is the warning, the reminder that comes before a righteous reclaiming of an item, “Leah, sharing is caring [grab marker].”   And, of course Sophia uses it when it works to her advantage.  “Sharing is caring,” she informs me, when I have a delicious chunk of homemade granola in my hands.  “Sharing is caring,” she reminds me when she wants me to hand over a bowl of popcorn during a movie.  But when it comes to Sophie being generous with what she’s got, Sharing is excruciating. 

At least it is right now.  

Away from Her

This weekend, for the first time since I went on my do-I-want-to-have-another-child cruise almost three years ago, I am away without Sophie.

It is so quiet, so peaceful.  Last night, I slept eight continuous hours.  Today I made breakfast for no one but myself.  And then I sat down here to write, without having to make Sophia a lunch, brush her hair and teeth, and drop her off at nursery school before having the space to do so. 

Heavenly. 

And yet, my thoughts keep turning towards her.  Not in a worrisome way.  But feeling her absence strongly.  In the little house where I am staying, there is an extra room off of mine with a single bed and a slanty ceiling and a tiny closet/crawl space just perfect for lining with blankets and hiding out.  I want to climb inside it with her.  At the beach, I gathered up well-worn stones, sanded to smoothness by the water that I want to give to her.  Yesterday, I saw a tiny crab, laboriously carry his oversized claw, walking sideways. I was reminded of last weekend, when Sophie and I watched The Little Mermaid together and the sea gull called Sebastian a “silly side walker.”  At the time, I had explained what it meant.  Now, I am sorry I am not able to show her.

As happy as I am to be alone, I know I would also enjoy having her at my side, sharing this with me, delighting in her every revelation that comes with a new experience.  Her gasps of surprise.  Her dances of delight.  The way she rushes toward each new thing with enthusiasm and intensity.  The looks on the faces of others watching her.  Knowing that she spreads joy everywhere she goes.  The pleasure of being her parent. 

But, to my surprise, there is no ache in my heart.  No sense of regret.  No sorrow.  This vision is simply a fantasy, a wish to have her here with me—not guilt-driven intrusive thoughts intended to punish myself for going away alone.

It might have been that a year ago.  I might have felt badly that I was going off to rest and renew, while saddling Kevin with the evening and morning routines and leaving Sophie in school for a full day.  I might have struggled to justify it—to Kevin, to others, but mostly to myself. 

“I haven’t taken a vacation in years.”

“Kevin’s going away to Ireland in October.”

“I work hard.  I’ve earned this.”

No.  I simply want this.   It is a secret that I am no longer afraid to speak.  And I say it with great joy. 

An Indecent Proposal

Sophia and I are eating breakfast together.  This is a time when Sophie is inclined to suddenly reveal a little tidbit of what happens in her life when I am not around.  I relish these moments. 

These crumbs of personal experience must be offered, I have learned.  When she comes home from school, she is always tight-lipped about her day.

“So, Soph…what happened in school today, anything interesting?”

“Can I listen to Seussical?”

“Can we talk for a little bit first?  I haven’t seen you all day.”

“Okay mommy.  I will tell you one thing.  Then, you have to turn on Seussical.”

I sigh.  I don’t want to grill her.  But come on.  Why the secrecy?  When I was a child, I was all too happy to share every intimate detail of my day with my mother.  Much to her chagrin.

My mom:  “What happened at school today?”  She braces herself.  Pours a cup of coffee.  Takes a seat. 

Me:  “First period: insert lengthy story.  Second period: insert lengthy story. “  I am oblivious to all social cues that I should speed things up.  Eyeball rolls. Yawns.  Glances at the clock.  (She teases me to this day, asking me when she calls, “So what happened during first period?”  Very funny, mom.) 

And even now, I catch my husband glazing over, when, in Technicolor, I illustrate for him exactly how the day went. 

Even my therapist, MY THERAPIST, jokes that I talk too much.  Can I help it?  I’m a storyteller.  It’s in my blood. 

But, clearly, this is one trait Sophie has not inherited from me.  Which is why, I get really excited when she engages in spontaneous sharing.  I try not to act too hungry for every gory detail, but I know my eager expression betrays me every time.

“Trip asked me to marry him,” she says, as casually as if she was saying she learned how to squats in Kick N’ Flips. 

“Who’s Trip?”  I had never heard of this Trip fellow.  Never seen him at Montessori before.  He must be a new kid.  Clearly, a man of action. 

“Oh, he’s not in my class.  He’s a napper.  I see him on the play ground.”

“When did he ask you to marry him?”

“So, Trip was already in the bathroom, and I showed up.”

“What was he doing?”  I pictured a one room bathroom.

“He was going to the potty.” 

“Okay….”

“And he asked me if I saw his foot.”

“So he was in a stall?”  She looks at me like I’m an idiot, as if this is why she never tells me anything. 

“Yes, Mommy.”

“So what did you do?”

“I said no.  And he said, can you see my foot now?  And I said no.  And he said “AHHHHHHH!  My butt’s on fire!”

“I’m not following.”

“He says that sometimes.  To be silly.”

“So then what happened?”

“Then he asked to marry me.”

“And what were you doing, when he proposed to you?”

“Oh, I was pee-ing,” she says, matter-of-factly.  Really.  Can you think of anything more romantic than this?

“So what did you say?”

“I told him…maybe,” she gives me a coquettish, side-long glance. 

“Why maybe?”

“Because.  I don’t know if I want to marry him, or PJ or Samantha.”   

I nod, understandingly, and reach for pen and paper.  

“Let me get this all down, I tell her. “ And she beams, while I write down her story, asking her to recount each detail, making sure I get it right.

When I’m finished, she asks, “Can I see?” 

“Well, I just kind of scribbled it, Soph.”  I tell her, handing her the slip of paper.  She studies it, and I watch her mouth move.  She’s reading it. 

“What do you think?” I ask?

“Great!” I can see she is quite pleased with herself. 

She may not suffer from the same verbal incontinence that I do, but she shares the same impulse.  We all share that impulse.