Practice Makes Perfect

One of my favorite parts of being a parent is the opportunity to observe personality in the making. Little Chic is at that age where she is becoming just a bit self-conscious, but when she isn't aware of her surroundings she still envelopes that essence of little-girlhood where her true insides are displayed right out in the open. It's such an interesting phenomenon with an eight year old, because rather than being in the true fantasy-land of a preschooler, an older child is gaining an understanding of the real world and you see them try on different aspects of it for size.

Tonight is a case in point. Little Chic has been anxiously awaiting a Cheetah Girls movie (sort of a modern-day musical) to come on the Disney Channel. It has been advertised quite a bit and today there was a countdown clock on Disney that showed how many hours/minutes/seconds until the premiere of this new movie. I had forgotten this detail, but earlier in the week, Little Chic had been feverishly looking for her favorite nightgown--a pink cheetah print with fake fur around the neckline. I had assumed it was in the laundry somewhere and told her she would have to wear it some other night when it was clean.

As 8:00pm drew near tonight (the time of the show), I realized that Little Chic wasn't sitting on the couch with a big bowl of popcorn the way I do when I'm getting ready to watch a much-anticipated movie. She was fully decked out in her cheetah-print nightgown, various scarves and belts draped around her waist and shoulders and she was standing about two feet from the screen singing along, doing motions and rehearsing the dance steps during each commercial. Apparently she had been searching for the nightgown so she could dress with the theme of the movie and pretend to be a musical star along with the characters in the show. I was a little surprised that she would still be interested in "dressing the part" but also aware that she didn't mention it to me because she would have been embarrassed for me to know. She didn't invite me to watch the movie with her as she usually does either, I think because that would have inhibited her participation--she wouldn't have the courage to fully enjoy herself in front of me since she was pretending and that would be "silly". I heard her from the other room giggling, laughing, bouncing up and down as things happened in the movie, and you would have thought she was actually watching the action real-time. With any hint of Hero Guy, Brainy Boy or me coming near the room, the activity abruptly stopped and she would nonchalantly sit, watching intently as if she had been there all evening.

It is so much fun watching my kids go from little people along to medium people and one day on up to big people. I've never been the type of parent to wistfully yearn for the days when they were babies or toddlers or back at some already experienced stage. I've always been excited and looked forward to their next steps because I learn so much about myself and human nature through watching them develop. It does put a huge sense of responsibility on me to be the caretaker of these little people who will be contributing members of society, spouses to somebody else's kids, neighbors in some town, employees at somebody's company. It is staggering to know that the type of parent I am today will directly affect the type of person they turn out to be. Never again in your life do you ever have the opportunity to so greatly influence the making of a person. It's a humbling prospect. I'm glad I'm not doing it alone - in the physical and the spiritual sense.