Ode to my Oldest

This oldest child of mine, he's now 16, has been an interesting person to get to know. He's quietly intense, slow to react to new situations, and pretty subdued in his reactions to things - even the best present in the world may be met with "Oh, cool." He's into Legos, anime, manga, Nintendo, computer games, Syfy, the Discovery Channel, table top RPG's, other interesting table-top games (can't really call them board games, because many of them don't have boards), the SCA when we get a chance to go, hanging out with his parents, hanging out with his parents friends, hanging out with his friends (at the public library's teen activities), all things space related, but not really into reading - which has always been one of my passions. He has taken procrastination to a level of fine art, and sometimes has issues dealing with the intensity of his little brother (a toddler who's almost two). He has a sensitivity to petroleum derived food additives, so much so that we changed our diet to get rid of them completely. He shares my sensitivity to smells, but we don't share the same bothersome smells. He's a very likeable person, though his tendency to fidget and squirm (one of the reasons we changed our diet) puts people off. He's quick - does math in his head in a way I never could. He's slow - I think he may be dyslexic. He's a bundle of teen-age contraryness and indecisiveness - one minute he says something purposely to push buttons, the next he's changing his mind about what he'd just said and arguing against what he'd espoused.

But there's a thing that he does that I love. When we decided to go to the museum last week, he at first was against the idea. He didn't want to go, had been once before with a friend and was sure he wouldn't find anything worth doing this time. We convinced him that he'd have a good time, especially since this would be his little brother's first time. He finally decided he would go, and we headed out. After the day was over, he told us "Thank you for convincing me to go. I had a really good time, and a lot of fun." This is the thing I love about him. When he is unsure about doing something, and we finally convince him to at least give it a try, he tells us when he had misconceptions about the thing and really enjoyed what we'd gone to do.

It's refreshing to see that - in anyone. Too many people are unwilling to admit when they're wrong about something, that it's surprising to see a young man willing to go out on a limb and let people know that he was wrong. For our part, we try to stay low-key when he says something like that. A usual response is "We're glad you decided to come along; we were pretty sure you'd enjoy yourself." Don't want him to think he's going to catch flak from us for speaking up, but we want to reinforce his openness. He's a pretty cool guy. I'm glad I'm his mom.

Fear and GMA

So all of the craziness of the Good Morning America piece earlier this week got me to thinking... What made this such a big deal? I think the answer comes down to Fear. Fear of difference, fear of the unknown, fear of bucking the norms of society, fear of going against the stream. If you really read the angry responses, you really get a feel for what's going on. The anger masks the thought of

"What if these different families are really on the right track?",

and the thoughts of

"Why do they think it's okay to be different?"

and

"What's wrong with being like everyone else?"

It's obvious that many people are uncomfortable with homeschooling in general - spouted several times in the 906 comments (current count) are questions of how children can learn anything without a certified instructor doing the teaching. Throw in the idea that there are children who spend their days without formal instruction at all, and even homeschoolers are confused, sometimes hostile, and at odds with the whole idea. Why? Because of the fear of the unknown.

"How does a child ever learn anything if you do not make them do the distasteful thing of going to school everyday?

How will they learn to deal with being in a hated job as adults, if they didn't have to learn to deal with a hated job as a child?

How will they make friends?

How will they have knowledge outside of video games and computer games and other fun things if they're never forced to learn something outside of the limited things they like?

They'll never learn to sit through boring meetings, and boorish co-workers, and write endless reports if they never have to do the same things at school.

All of this points to the big huge fear of unknown and being different. If you're different, you're not a normal part of society. If you're not sending your child to school, you're not giving them the same experiences as the rest of society, thus, they will be different and not normal like everyone else. If I buck the system, and don't send my child to school, they'll be "different"; they'll never get a job other than a "you-want-fries-with-that?" job, they'll never have a boyfriend/girlfriend, they'll be living at home forever, they'll be different from me. After all, I had to do this horrible thing, so my child must do it too. It's all a part of growing up like everyone else.

There's always a part of me that wants to ask these fearful people this: If we never encourage our children to think creatively, how are they going to come up with the creative answers we need to solve problems that are still plaguing us? Why must we always hate our jobs, why can we not encourage our future generations to find jobs that they enjoy?

My oldest, 16 yrs, has never been to school (the youngest is only 20 mos, but won't be going to school either) and that fact occasionally comes up in conversations between my two closest friends and me. Often the topic is how is he going to survive with no similarities between himself and the rest of his agemates in this country. Most recently, I raised this point to them... if we had lived outside the US the whole time, and he'd grown up outside the influence in this nation, his experiences would be completely different from the kids here in the States - and no one would really think anything of it. If that's the case, then why is it so horrible for his experiences to be different? They really couldn't provide an answer other than he wasn't raised in that situation, so it didn't really matter. Both of these women are very intelligent, capable of using logic, and extrapolating information and using it. Neither of them is comfortable with this choice.

Their reactions to this life decision is one of the reasons we don't generally discuss just how radical we are with anyone else. Our families know we homeschool, and I may have discussed with my mother unschooling (I know we've talked about attachment parenting and extended breastfeeding), but I know I'd never tell them just how relaxed life is around here. They already think I'm doing my children a disservice by allowing him to not go to school.

I personally love the freedom it gives us. Case in point, yesterday after being dismissed from jury duty, we all headed to the Museum of Nature & Science (in the middle of the day) and spent a few hours wandering around, exploring. When my husband's work schedule changes, and his days off fall in the middle of the week, we can still go do the things we want to do as a family without having to miss school to do it. If we want to take a vacation, we can - limited only by seasonal appropriateness, and not by whether or not school is in session or what he'll miss if we go during the school year.

This life works for us, and it works for others. It may not work for everyone, but there's no need for fear. There's enough room in this world for all of the differences.