We saw Yoda today after we went to MoMATH (where we pretty much did the exact same agenda that we did last time... the math moppets did earn their cups o' mac and cheese by actually exerting some effort to understand the concepts, as opposed to just treating the space like a playground).
On our way home we of course had to stop by the enormous pet store across from Union Square, and look at every single animal there from the fish to the birds to the reptiles to the male rodents with the enormous you-know-whats (what's with that?). We always spend a great deal of time getting to know the cats. We would all love to have a cat, but can't because of allergies. Today we noticed one named Molly who had crawled under her bed and wedged herself between it and the side of the kennel, and just peeked out at us with beautiful, but nervous eyes. Her info card explained that she had been "rescued from a hoarder." The Sister looked so heartbroken as she said, "So, she's doing that because she's used to being wedged between piles...?" We are shaped by our experiences. What a responsibility it is to be a parent.
I was talking to my dad on the phone yesterday because it was his birthday, and it struck me (as he was talking about a project he was working on that required a blow torch) just how much he was shaped by his father. His dry sense of humor that permeates most everything he says (unless he's pissed off), how he gets excited to share new bits of information he's acquired, his fearlessness in tackling a new project, even the way he posited that you pretty much have to go into every project anticipating that you will make mistakes (it sounded just like what my grandpa used to tell me... I can seriously hear his voice: "Well, kid, you just have to know it's not going to go well [and here he would grin at me], but you do it anyway. Sure, sure. You do it anyway because what else are you going to do? [chuckle, and the smile he had that pulled back his ears] And then you learn how to do it a little bit better the next time. See?"). We are shaped by our parents, who have been shaped by their parents. How lucky a person is when the people behind her, or him, have been well-intentioned. And funny. My kids think that my dad, their Papa, is hilarious. From the time The Boy was very little he would good-naturedly smile at his grandfather's teasing. For his birthday they wrote their daily poems for him:
(The Boy's)
Papa
Some eat cake others do not, It is way
out in Nevada
Where there's sagebrush that blooms endless.
It's Papa's birth Yeah! Yeah! I think
We need to celebrate
1, 2, 3 let's go get a birthday cake today
Happy Birthday, Papa!
(The Girl's)
Papa's Birthday
Papa's birthday
includes 3 cats or more
and yummy food
and things to build
I'm actually not sure if she was done with that poem (I kind of hijacked their little poetry notebooks), but I like that she included "things to build," as I think that that desire to always learn how to make new things is a part of my dad's identity that I hope has passed on to my kids. It's not so much any one project he's ever made, but rather the fact that he's always tried so many projects.
In Return of the Jedi, Yoda admonished Luke: "Pass on what you have learned." Oh, Master Yoda, I learn at your feet! I'm thinking that our behaviors and modeling will probably pass on one way or another whether we want them to or not (let's face it, our kids are all going to be Molly-the-hoarder's-cat to a greater or lesser degree), but maybe the things that we learn -- that aren't often obvious externally -- are things that we need to make a conscious effort to also pass on? During dinner? In journals? On a walk? I'm so glad that I didn't have the internet or a cell phone when I was a teenager spending the summers with my grandparents... I fear that all those passing-on-moments might not have happened if I wasn't just hanging out on the couch slack-jawed, or perched and hunched up like a buzzard on the kitchen stool tracing the counter's edge with my fingertip.
