I called her from the bedroom where I was putting her baby sister to sleep. She was in her study table – drawing or might be writing songs and proses, her newly-found interest that keeps her occupied during her free time. She was quite in a hurry, her face was that of shock and worry. In short, exaggeratedly rushing. I told her to change that face and calm down. My tone was on gentle default when I called her since I was lulling the tiny one. So to see her theatrical reaction just made me want to shift to my inner green beast immediately. I did my best to pull out my Mary Poppins demeanor and told her to buy veggies for sinigang that I'd cook for lunch. After she listed it down and got the money, she took off her unicorn headband and got a simpler one (she said she doesn't want attention), a coin purse and her gray uggs. Do you see the irony? It appears in her every moment.
My firstborn, the child I delivered in the midst of personal crisis, has a rather odd combination of complex qualities. No thanks to her emotional, frank, inquisitive, logical, evasive and lazy genes. She did not come from a mediocre family, that is why. Both sides have each quality in its superlative. It's amusing to see a bit of me in her, though. Like, when someone pronounces a word wrongly, that's me right there with the sharp tone and poker face! But when she does it the way I do at her age and stage in life, I cringe. No way my gradeschooler would sound so disrespectful and obnoxious. When it happens, I quickly jump in. I don't want her to grow up thinking she knows better than everyone else. See the difficulty of trying to balance everything in parenting? If you think sleepless nights of having a newborn is exhausting, wait till you reach the double digits. May this serve as a warning, haha.