macchiato mama: this I believe

When my little sister was two and I was four, my father took us by the hand, led us to the kitchen, and said to my mother, “Put these girls to work.” He meant exactly what he said, and from that point on, he began to banish childishness from our childhood.

Children deserve childhood—this I passionately believe.

Imagine childhood as a sort of chrysalis, a thing of simple beauty which protects the amazing process of transformation from infant to adult.

You can easily destroy it with violence, and yet you can also damage the emerging adult by assisting it too much. The childhood I believe all children deserve is one that is protected from abuse, but in which the child is allowed to experience normal struggles necessary for building a strong adult.

My father was very strict and had eccentric ideas—to say the least—about raising children. We could not waste time, act foolish, read or talk about imaginary things, and he got rid of the few toys we had. We were not allowed to read most children’s books because they contained foolishness and fantasy. Instead of playing with other children, we were expected to engage in adult discussions.

Much worse, though, was the mental, emotional, and--occasionally--physical abuse. No child should have to shoulder their parents’ emotional baggage. Every kid deserves to play typical childhood games instead of learning early how to navigate mind games. Most of all, every child deserves to grow up with innocence intact, and no child ever, ever deserves to experience physical abuse and exploitation. In many ways, I didn’t have a childhood.

I have given my children many of the things I missed; fantasy and fun and yes, foolishness. I have taken great pleasure in giving my children plenty of time to play; in fact, I learned to play, from them. But I have also taught them the value of hard work, the simple joys of nature, and to be considerate of others, because ironically, in spite of having everything a child’s heart could desire, a lot of children still don’t really have much of a childhood.

My father didn’t believe in children playing, but he did consider it worthwhile for us to spend time in nature. Because of this, we did an astonishing amount of playing, for kids who weren’t allowed to play. We sneaked away from the serious task of berry-picking to run with bare feet down the scorching rails to where the river ran under the railroad and jumped off the top of the massive culvert into the icy waters of the shadowy swimming hole on hot summer days.

We weren’t allowed to ride our bikes just for fun, but to us it was still fun to fly breathlessly fast down the steep hill three miles to town to get the mail, and then trudge slowly the long way back, enjoying the exhausting uphill climb because for us, that wasn’t work. We had complete freedom to wander through the woods as much as we wanted if our work was done, where away from disapproving eyes we floated stick boats smeared with pine pitch in the creek and built teepees. In precious stolen hours here and there, I had a childhood rich in resourceful, imaginative play. It is the memory of those sweet hours that has kept me from giving my children the latest and greatest of everything out there and to put limits on the gadgets they do have.

I want them to know how to use their imaginations to create their own fun sometimes,

and to have plenty of time to dream.

Parenting is a delicate balancing act, and I don’t even begin to think I have it figured out; every day I doubt my ability to do the job. When I looked into my firstborn’s face, I wanted desperately to give my children a childhood--but in so many ways I didn’t even know what one was like. So I just do my best to shelter the chrysalis and yet let them experience the struggle of emergence.