My kid isn’t reading at the second grade level he is supposed to, according to school testing, on the one hand. On the other, his special ed counselor said he’s smoking his classmates in reading advancement when he joins small groups that include third graders. I’m told he’s too bored with his school work to succeed. I’m told he’s a distraction to other kids and needs to consider repeating a grade. It all terrifies me because schools terrify me and because I thought I was a good student. I learned from Mom’s hoarded school records that I was not. I think I’ve mentioned this here elsewhen.
This morning I woke up anxious and decided to have a talk with him. I asked if he would do me a favor and try reading more. He said he doesn’t like books because he reads them so slow in class because he doesn’t know all the words, and then he’s embarrassed because he’s “the worst.”
I have friends who are hearing this with their kids too. They beat themselves up for poor performance and give up as soon as they’re out the gate.
As I write this, I can see out my office window and through the glass wall of a luxury apartment high rise, a fit young man grooming himself in the bathroom wearing nothing but underwear. He is flossing his teeth, applying deodorant, trimming facial hair—the gestures are particularly unflattering, and not the actions portrayed in ads or movies. I’m incredulous at the architect or designer who positioned the bathroom sink next to a glass exterior wall, but not surprised by the audacity. We are in the heart of the city and approximately 19 floors up. He must feel like a sergeant of industry.
He is done and now a young woman enters the bathroom in a loose t-shirt. She undresses to nothing at all and cleans her groin with a washcloth. She must be a visitor.
I wonder if my child will grow up to measure success with the upper climes of glass buildings, meticulous grooming habits, a lover hanging around in one of his t-shirts waiting to use the bathroom and grateful not to have gone in first lest the young man find himself in the aura (or worse), of the lover’s toilet; a cascade of unflattering gestures that say nothing about satisfying experiences or requirements. To advance at the rate one must.
Or will he languish alone while in my home, unable to read the way he’s supposed to, content not to berate himself anymore. Words are so common. They find their way to us. I will not hold my breath. I will not make him, either.
