Pinot, Bretzels, and Cathedrals

We have a friend in South Africa who unfortunately witnessed our Beth in one of her more uncompromising moments, and his observation of “The force is strong in that one”, has stuck with me ever since.  That was more than two years ago- even before her second birthday.  Ian was right- my little Elizabeth is an uncompromising force to be reckoned with.

As a baby, she was alot easier than Alex.  Or perhaps I was simply less neurotic, and instead of stressing about changing her nappy 3 times a night, with every 3-hourly feed, she slept all night in one nappy, and I didn’t worry too much if she only fed for 15 minutes (when Alex had kept me occupied for 45 minutes every feed).  Being baby number 2, I had discovered what was absolutely necessary, and what I could get away with.

She was sent off to day care/school at 5 months, and I can’t help but wonder if this hardened her somewhat- she had to deal with a boy who bit her more than once, and subsequently learnt that you can get what you want through acts of despicability, and here I have to confess- even I have asked Alex to give in to Beth sometimes when it looks like she’s rearing her pearlers.  Sadly, I have always let her get away with it, based on my thinking that she’s too young to understand reasoning. And when you’re a working mom (because of need, and not want), there are just some battles you face, and some that you let slide.

However, it is now 15 months into my new motherhood role, and I am learning more about small children than I gathered in 4 years of toddlerhood between the two girls.

Part of me wants to say that Beth remains an enigma- an inscrutable or mysterious person,  or something hard to understand or explain(according to an on-line dictionary).  But now that I have written that down, I know that she is not myserious, or hard to explain.  No, it’s something else.

I think she has a very good idea of ‘right’ from ‘wrong’, and ‘good’ from ‘not-so-good’, but she chooses to use what suits her best. The reason I can say this, is because there are 2 things she does that makes me aware that she is not a little baby anymore.

Toilet rolls- sometimes when you’re in a rush, you grab a new loo-roll, but you don’t take the time to put it into the holder (you’ll do it next time, when you’re not being watched by hungry eyes).  Well, the one person in my house that I can count on to replenish the toilet paper, is Beth.  I kid you not.  Okay, yes, Anton is reliable as well, but sometimes I have actually stopped to consider there is a OCD toilet ghost in my home.

The other nuance of Beths’ is her bed. My ‘baby’ girl is the one person in my home to actually pull up her duvet/blanket every day.  If I’m not expecting visitors, and am rushing off to get girls to school, my bed lies an abondonment of sheets and pyjamas, but I can pop into the girls room, and though I WILL see their pyjamas on the floor, Beth’s bed will have been straightned up, and heaven forbid you crease it in any way.

Of course, there is her uncanny ability to direct us to the ice-cream vendor when we are out on a Sunday walk in the city. Let’s not forget her dogged determination to avoid walking or cycling anywhere that isn’t rewarded by ice-cream at the end, and there have been far too many awful confrontations in this regard. Many an occasion has passed where she has been energised to take her bike into town, but upon returning home, she developes fatigue, and insists we carry her, and her bike.

Last weekend the girls cycled to the mall so that I could pick up 2 bag-fuls of groceries. The mall is less than 1 kilometer away, and we have walked this route often. In the hour we were there, the girls towed the line without question- no inner-shop tantrums about why I was not buying beignets, no fighting about who was pulling the shopping-basket-on-wheels. With my hands full with shopping bags, we headed out to unlock the bikes, and I was met with an instantaneous “I’m not cycling home Mommy. I’m tired”. Her inability to understand that I could not push a bike, as well as carry 2 bags of groceries brought on a screaming, crying tantrum of such mammoth proportion that wwhen we did eventually get home, she fell asleep almost immediately. Perhaps she was tired. But I was not going to relent, particularly after she screamed at me “Don’t do this to me Mommy” with such meaningful pitch that our Scorpio natures met up like lightning striking the earth. There is nothing more humiliating than watching your almost 4 year old make you out to be a monster in front of a shopping center of Frenchmen. I did not give in to her, and eventually we managed to move away from the very public areas to quieter streets. Here I eventually had to walk away from her anguish, although I did ask Alex to watch her from behind a building. When Alex told me that there was a man helping her- pushing her on the bike, I stepped out and very forcefully said to him “Non monsieur. S’il vous plait, non”. Perhaps I should have swallowed the kindness of strangers, but my rage was so intense at my child, all I felt was that she needed to know crying was not the answer.

She had another 95 minute tantrum on Wednesday, brought on probably by hunger, and the fact that I did not bring a snack to school pickup at 11h15. Torn between hunger, and a desire to play, she could not get to the bottom of her emotions, and for almost 2 hours, she was implacable. My own personal anguish while listening to the crying centred around an article shared by an American friend about why smacking children and administering hidings is an unacceptable form of discipline.

Send in the police, because I confess- Beth has received many smacked bums by my hand. While the suggestion of appropriate punishment should be to take away a privelege, or quiet time to reflect is probably a good idea, I do wonder if a child really understands punishment administered 4 hours after the event? And let’s be honest- if you find yourself confronted with a tantrum while out shopping- where do you send the child for quiet time? Don’t get me wrong- I’m not trying to ask you to forgive me for giving my child a hiding- it’s true that it does give out conflicting signals of love and anger, and that there is no real line between hidings and what could be considered abuse.

I have realised this week that there are no benefits to handing out hidings, and that it takes a skilled parent to deal with discipline without resorting to the age old punishment handed out to us as children.

Going back to Beth getting tired to not want to walk and cycle, I do sometimes wonder if we expect too much of her. Admittedly, we do a fair bit of walking, and as we go about town, I do notice that there are a fair portion of children that are roughly the same size as Beth that get to sit in prams as their parents go about town. (Even more frighteningly are those kids that sit in prams, with dummies attached to their faces). Is this how it is that French children don’t seem to throw tantrums- their parents go about their way by avoiding conflict? I have an English friend who suggests that French parents do not actually give their children much attention at all until they are school going age, about 4 years old. I think that her view is a harsh one, but I have a French friend whose somewhat disapproving opinion is that in English househould, the child is king, and thus the center of their universe.

In our house, I could say that Alex could be French, and that Beth tries her darndest to be English, much to my dismay. That being said, Alex can’t seem to entertain herself on her own, while Beth is more than happy to open cupboards and help herself to whatever she can in order to keep herself busy. And when they have their moments of closeness, I might walk into a room where the door is closed, only to be told to go away. I shut the door in trepidation… what will the room resemble when I have to get them to start tidying up?

But aside from those hours of trying to reason with and pacify mon petite monstre, she is such a delight. She crawls into my bed before coffee time, and plants her smackers firmly on mine, announcing with a contented sigh “I love you mommy”. When she has moments of enjoying her meals (which is just as often as not), she will tell me how “delish-ish” it was. One evening she wandered into the kitchen to ask me if I had stopped “making smells”, clearly a mark of approval. And she loves Parmesan cheese! If I have ever had a cheerful conversation with you even once in your life, she will adopt you as her new best friend, greeting you with a cheerful “hello” and wave whenever she sees you.

I’m not sure if you’re aware that Beth and I share a birthday- not by some force of nature, but more force of elective caesar and me not wanting to overnight in hospital on a weekend. So she and I are both Scorpios, and if you go for that sort of thing, no doubt you will shudder at the mismatch of it. Well, she was always going to have a sting in her tail, whether she was born on my birthday, or a week later. I have, however, been warned by a friend who shares her birthday with HER mother. While they are as close as they are, my friend had a closer relationship with her father, and a somewhat tempestuous relationship with her mom. Perhaps this is mine and my Beth-meisters’ destiny?

Whatever the answer, whatever the best method is to disciplining her, we’re in for one delightful journey with her!

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