Smrt

My son is a moron. He’s a dolt, a dimwit, and dumb as a sack of hammers. Or, at least, that’s what our Parents as Teachers representive would have us believe.

Okay, she didn’t really say that. In so many words. But I’ve come to realize that one needs to be very careful in choosing one’s comments when evaluating the children of others. I’ve never been very competitive, but all parents seem to be violently and absurdedly defensive of their children’s development.

Mr. Hatfield: ‘Hey, you got a right smart kid!’

Mr. McCoy: ‘Smart? You sayin’ she’s ugly? You think your kid’s prettier ‘n mine?’

Mr. Hatfield: ‘You sayin’ she ain’t?’

[Painful death ensues.]

After Ian’s development screening last week, Kelly and I kinda felt the same way. Minus the death.

I wasn’t there, but apparently the purpose of this test was to have measured Ian’s development against his peers, and determine whether we should continue reading to him, or cut our losses and satisfy his curiosity with lots of shiny things.

See what I mean? Defensive.

Really, it was just a set of skills tests designed to evaluate Ian’s general mental and physical development. Personally, I’ve always been impressed with how well Ian does with most tasks, though he’s a little slow on the take when it comes to putting one foot in front of the other. But consider the source(s).

Ian did miserably on many of the tests.

He was asked to feed a baby doll with a bottle – nevermind the fact that Ian was breastfed, and hasn’t seen a bottle in nearly a year. Kelly mentioned this to the PAT educator, but rules are rules. So Ian didn’t know how to feed the baby.

The next evening before choir rehearsal, we took Ian to the church nursery to repeat the experiment, this time with a spoon; got it in one. We tried the bottle again, and after stabbing the doll in the chest – which I attribute to overzealousness and inaccuracy – Ian figured out how to feed the stupid doll.

He was also asked to stack blocks. It’s said that, in order to create, one must destroy. If so, Ian is the most creative child I’ve ever met. He only managed to stack three blocks before his creative juices took over, and he toppled his tower and the educator’s expectations.

That night, I repeated this exercise, too. Ian wasn’t trying to knock over the blocks – he was trying to pick up the topmost block with his mouth, which resulted in the blocks being knocked over. I won’t even try to explain the ‘why’, but this seems darned creative, and I dare anyone of any age to try the same without taking out a few wooden blocks. Had this woman never played Jenga?

Ian also had trouble identifying colors, speaking clearly, counting, and was generally fairly uncooperative. Which pretty much describes my son (and most one-year-olds) through-and-through: if Ian does anything, he does it on his own terms. And he won’t do it for long, because there are too many other things to do.

My problem isn’t that Ian did poorly on this screening, or that the PAT educator neglected to tell Kelly that she could request the screening be given at another time, when Ian would be more responsive. My concern is that I can’t explain any of this to Ian.

He’s always been very perceptive of others, and is emotionally sensitive. When he gets upset or cries, it’s often because he knows he’s misbehaved, or that he’s somehow disappointed us. Ian may not have known why he was being asked to stack blocks and feed babies, but he could tell that he was doing something wrong.

When Kelly comes to get me from work, Ian will usually wave at me from the car, or laugh – lately he’s started roaring. The day of the screening, Ian just sat in his carseat, pouting. It wasn’t his defiant, ‘mommy won’t let me’ pout; the kid was sad. He wouldn’t smile, wouldn’t laugh – he wouldn’t even look at me.

When I took him from the car, Ian buried his head in my neck. I almost cried.

In the end, who gives a barnacle about what kids should or shouldn’t be doing? What does it matter if a twenty-one-month-old can count to three or ten, or if she can speak in trochaic pentameter?

Ian knows how to be happy, how to say ‘Please’, and how to give hugs. Which is more than I can say for the rest of us.

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