Questions. Children have them. They are a never-ending chasm of questions and wonder. Of course, we want to encourage their questioning, their desire to know. Some damn days the answers don’t come as easily as we would like, though.
The other day Professor Chaos bolted into the living room, presumably basking in the glory of the removed baby gate, and positioned himself at the end of the couch. He had a question. Tilting his rainbow colored head to the side he began:
“Mom, dad says that boys can have vaginas and girls can have penises,” I confirmed that what his father had told him was correct and then I waited for the question(s) that I knew were about to follow.
“Well, how is that?” I breathed a sigh of relief, that one would be fairly easy to explain. I told him that people don’t always feel that their outside matches the person inside, so they take steps in a long process to make that happen. Sometimes that means changing everything, sometimes that just means a few things change. What’s in their underwear doesn’t define if they are male or female, though, the person defines that.
He nodded in understanding and then said, “Well, I get that. That’s not what I’m asking, though”. Then my heart skipped a beat because there wasn’t going to be anything easy about this conversation.
He started again “I want to know how they have a penis or vagina”. I looked at him for a moment, slightly confused, because we’ve discussed reproduction before, but he’s only seven and it’s been a while so I figured he needed a refresher. “Well, it happens in the womb when the baby is forming.” Then we watched a video on male and female sex organs and a four-minute time-lapse animated video on fetal development.
Rolodex of Awesome
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This work by Rayven Holmes is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
This past weekend we enjoyed some holiday music; I introduced T.B.M. to The Chipmunk Christmas album, and assembled our Christmas tree! T.B.M. had a blast with it this year, the older they get the more they enjoy our traditions (like picking out a new ornament each year) and decorating our tree. While putting our ornaments on the tree General Disarray noticed some tassels in the bag. When I graduated high school I received an additional set of cap tassels. I wasn’t really sure what to do with the tassels and one Christmas decided to just toss them on our tree. Since then, each year, I toss them on the tree. This year General Disarray got a hold of them before I could and he was perplexed by them.
He inquired about them and I told him they go on a graduation cap and I received those when I finished high school. He seemed ok with that answer, commented that it wasn’t an ornament, and tossed it back in the bag. He grabbed a “real” ornament and came over to the side of the tree where I was hanging stuff and quietly asked “Will I graduate high school”. I told him that I had planned on him graduating from our homeschool. He said “Ok” and then paused, thought about what I had said, and then said: “You didn’t work with your parents?...You didn’t do school at home?” I told him that I wasn’t homeschooled, I had to attend public school (he had assumed that my high school was a homeschool). After telling him that he placed the ornament on the tree, looked at me and said “I’m sorry you weren’t homeschooled mom”.
As he walked away to grab another ornament I couldn’t help but smile a little. I often worry if I’m ruining their lives. There are enough negative voices out there to plague any homeschooling parent with plenty of doubt in their choice-a choice many of us have thought long and hard about-. Then in one brief moment my son assured me that yes, we have made the right choice. He felt sorry for me, sorry I couldn’t spend the day getting to know my parents, I couldn’t enjoy my sibling the way he does. I couldn’t enjoy my dad’s weekdays off or days when his work schedule allowed him to actually be home (and awake) during the day. The very things I use to explain why we homeschool to other people my own children see as positives, and in that one moment General Disarray taught me that his and his brother’s opinions were the only ones that should matter.
They are happy at home. And it’s about time I stopped worrying about what they may be missing and enjoy what we aren’t missing, time with each other.
