Practice
As I write this, the quote, “Seek to understand, not to be understood”, comes to the forefront of my mind. These words tend to make their way around spiritual discussion spaces and I am not sure who to attribute the words to. I am a writer, mother, student, and teacher so I know the importance of quote attribution but for now I hope that my lack of a source will not send the quote police to my doorstep.
Forgive me for I digress.
Where was I. Oh right. It has been a day. You can probably relate. Parents and children and different energies and, “thank you for stealing the tape again!!”. These were words that emanated from my 9-year-old daughter’s hands as she emphatically signed — using American Sign Language (ASL) this to me earlier this morning. Maybe you have experienced this or something similar as of late. You are sitting at the table trying to drink your coffee or whatever morning beverage opens your eyes/brain on a Sunday morning and suddenly, your child who is functioning from a different state of mind accuses you of stealing tape.
AGAIN.
What?
What now?
That was just the beginning. I will save the rest for another time. You can probably fill in the blanks with your own tales of UPSET children.
And then I suppose the tape was found because I was not blamed for stealing it again and that concluded round one of ‘9-year-old is VERY not pleased with mom’ for this fine Sunday. As I write about this now, I cannot help but chuckle because of course these words sound amusing.
As I said, it has been a day. Mostly for me. The ‘day’ of which I speak is partially due to some exhaustion which you can also probably relate to. And how the days seem to just sashay into one another, like a dance that never ends. This exhaustion is partially why I needed the child to get some air and to expend some of that 9-year-old energy lest maybe this day might end before tomorrow technically begins.
And outside she went. Clad in a green coat with a sparkly unicorn on the back and a multicolored pink hat that her aunt and uncle sent her from New York for Hanukkah. I was looking forward to finishing a workout recorded by my personal trainer on Friday morning, I had gotten through a full 20 minutes of it since then. Here was my chance to continue. But I noticed that it was getting dark and so I put on my coat and trapsed to the back of the house where she was playing. When I arrived outside, I found her climbing around the small piles of blackish snow, the sequins from the unicorn sparking from afar.
She told me a story about how a few minutes before she had been playing and a few neighborhood boys had, as she signed, “took advantage that I was Deaf.”
I have been learning ASL since she was born, and I am studying to become an interpreter, but until we arrived inside about an hour ago and she wrote these words on a whiteboard that I learned the sign for ‘advantage’ as in to take advantage of someone.
“Why did you feel like they were taking advantage of you?”, I asked her.
She signed, “because they knew that I couldn’t respond or anything and I would just walk away.” She continued, “The boys came to where I was playing and started hitting the snow with a long stick and I said, “Um, I’m playing here. And the boys said, “I don’t care.”
And the next thing I did was something I have read about in books about parenting and heard other people talk about but in the moment of ‘real actual life’ it is extremely hard to put into practice.
And here it is.
I said nothing. Nothing. I did not shovel my own feelings inside her and tell her how or what to feel. I had some feelings, but I did not share them. And then, after A DAY where this mom has felt some frustration and even needed to give myself a ‘time to breathe and think’ as I walked outside to gather myself. For longer than a few minutes. And text one of my oldest friends in North Carolina for support and call the daughter’s father and say, “here please talk to this child because I need a minute.” After all of that the next words she signed rendered me nearly speechless.
She signed, “What will I do if that happens again”?
What will I do if that happens again?
My response, “I’m not sure… we’ll need to think about it.” And then I asked her, “is this the first time something like this has happened?” Her response, “Yes, it was.”
Here’s what:
I will forever be learning ASL and I will forever be learning how to be a mother and a human being, and I will forever be learning about how to have compassion for myself and other human beings. Because I believe that we are, all of us, doing our best with what we know, at any given moment.
Earlier today I was listening to Brene Brown’s ‘Dare to Lead’ podcast with President Barack Obama. At one point he spoke about how sometimes multiple things — seemingly disparate things can be true at the same time.
I seek to believe that is true.
I seek to believe that these young children just do not know yet about how my daughter is just like them; not better than or less than; that to be hearing does not equal one thing while to be Deaf equals something else.
My daughter is sassy and strong willed and brazen and confident. After this situation occurred, she did not run into the house crying — which she could have done. She is 9 years old after all. Nope, she actually calmly explained what happened. It is amazing how reasonable and wise they can be.
What is my goal as I write this?
I suppose my goal is to encourage us as caretakers of children of this generation who will surely inherit this earth to teach our children about the things that are truly important so that they might be able to hold duality within themselves, so that they might know that it does not matter if you are Deaf or hearing or Black, brown, or white.
We can learn from each other.
If I do not speak your language, literally or figuratively, I can try to learn it or I can wonder how you experience reality, and I can know that whatever that experience is — it is not better or worse than me
