Yesterday afternoon, I picked the kids up from school and we hustled into the village so I could get my hair cut. On the way, we chatted about our days and the kids told me about school. And Naomi was full of the news that the senior block (that’s the kids Naomi’s age and up) were going to be having a disco during term 3. AND she was excited about that. AND parents were invited. AND she and her friend F had decided that it would be totally embarrassing if their parents actually came, and so she was asking me not to come very nicely. I, of course, first needed to tease her about the “very nicely” there at the end of the sentence. That was, I was told, because she and F didn’t want to hurt their parents’ feelings, and so they wanted to ask us not to come because we would embarrass them very nicely. We talked for a few minutes about how asking someone not to go somewhere when they’ve been invited is just about never a “very nicely” sort of thing to do. Yes, Naomi understood that, but it was the best she could manage and were my feelings hurt.
And no, my feelings aren’t hurt. And somewhere, they probably are hurt a little. Naomi, who has been on the verge of adolescence since she was three, creeps closer and closer. If I thought that the move to the edge of the world would slow the creep, I was probably right. But slow isn’t stopping.
[An aside about this train ride. Today the wind is coming from the south and blowing out over the hills on to the sea. It’s a stiff and cold wind, but it’s flattening the waves and making the water lake-smooth. Just now I’m passing over the rock pools at the edge of the sea and I can see down into the bottom, seaweed dancing gently in the current. Wonder if the seaweedlets ever ask their parents not to dance so awkwardly while their friends are watching…)
I’m amazed, actually, at what it’s like to experience this transitional time from right here in the house. I taught kids who were just a little older than Naomi, and I gave minimal amounts of thought to what it would be like to live with those creatures who brought stuffed animals to school one day and talked about bras and lipstick the next. And yesterday’s question brings it all back to me and I realise that now I’m in that space myself.
Naomi flirts with independence. She pressed me really hard the first months we were here to be allowed to travel around the village on her own. She was too big to be walked to school, too big to be picked up. Finally I allowed those things and let her walk to school alone (with tears in my eyes about how she didn’t really need me anymore) and walk home from school alone (anxiously checking the clock until she was safely home). And of course it was at that point that she stopped asking. More than that, when it would be more convenient for me if she got herself (and Aidan) to and from school, she complains that she loves to be with me, and she doesn’t like to go places alone. Push me pull you. And I, who have seen the winds begin to mark the coming change in the weather, walk her to school proudly, holding her hand, and laughing, and kissing her, because it’s still allowed.
(For those of you who worry about Aidan and his development, I can say that he’s reading like mad, he’s learned to ride his bike, and he’s deciding whether he wants to learn to tie his shoes. “I’m learning too many new things right now, Mom—it makes me tired. I’m just not ready for the shoe-tying thing.” I’ll keep you posted for readiness.)
And a final aside about the train journey. Here, towards the end where it’s more urban and not so spectacular, I’ve put my head down to work on my book proposal, the next draft of which is due soon. Glancing up from the computer, I see a glimpse of rainbow. New Zealand, for some reason, has lots of rainbows. This one, which captivated me, is different from any I’ve ever seen. First it’s a rainbow that stretches inside a puffy white cloud and disappears behind a hill. Lovely—and unexpected, because other than a couple of those puffy white clouds, the sky is clear blue. Then, as the train moves, so does the rainbow, until it is a full arc, moving from as far as I can see on one edge to as far as I can see on the other. Nearly all of the rainbow is against clear blue sky. I didn’t know this was possible and had no idea how unexpected and beautiful it would be to see a rainbow on a full sunny day, no rain in sight. Would I call it something else? A sunbow? And in the sparkling sunshine, backed by bright blue, the rainbow’s colours are even more spectacular than I’ve ever seen. There is a message here in the rainbow, a promise of unexpected beauty, fulfilled on a train ride on a chilly winter Thursday in June.
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