“It’s been nice having you around,” said my son.
I haven’t even made cookies for them every day, and they still think it’s nice that I am there when they get home from school. I like that.
I got to go to #2 son’s gymnastics class yesterday. I have never been able to watch the Tuesday class, since I have been at the store at the time. The Saturday class is all floor work, but the Tuesday class also uses horses and uneven parallel bars and stuff. There is an observation room for parents, and people invariably ask “Which one is yours?”
I no longer ask this, because then they will of course have to ask me. Then I say, “the boy in the red shirt” or whatever it might be that day, and there is the moment of silence while they are being all impressed and then they say, “Oh, he’s really good!”
If I were the first to ask “Which one is yours?” it would seem that I was inaugurating the exchange in order to brag.
It isn’t that good to be the best in your group. To me, that means that it is time to move to another group. One of the parents last night said essentially that: that is was a shame there wasn’t a more competitive class for him.
Then this morning I was chivvying #1 son about his scholarships. He had not even applied for the basic state one, since he assumed that he would not be good enough. I went to the website and found that his ACT scores and GPA were well within the range. He was amazed. This is a scholarship designed to encourage good students to stay in our state for college, something our older two girls did not do. Something, in fact, that a lot of the good students here do not do. This kid doesn’t think of himself as a good student. He is not the best in his group.
I don’t like to be the best in a group. If I am, then it seems as though I should not be in that group. I don’t like to be the worst, either. I like to be in the middle.
What about you?
Never really thought about it. In dancing and music I was always in more than one group and they were at different levels so while I might be near the top in one I would be lower down in the more experienced group. Also all the non-school groups I have ever been in have been mixed age including youngsters and adults (I was the youngster in a group of adults at music, adult in a group of youngsters in many of my dance classes) and we don’t tend to compare ourselves to those who are of a markedly different age than ourselves. At school I was in an academically streamed class from 11 so for 6 years I was with my academic peers anyway and the ‘top’ student depended on who did the most work. If we didn’t do the work we knew we would not be at the top in the class. We chose to do the work or not. (Had we all done the work we would have all been top as there was little difference among us all as far as natural intelligence was concerned) As a teen and young adult I was in a practically all male environment so I didn’t compare myself to my working peers then either. Now I’m in a teaching/research environment and we all have different teaching/research strengths and weaknesses so while I may be better at some things than others, there are also things that others are better at than I am.
I like to be challenged. I guess that means I don’t like to be the best – but I do like to hold myself to their standards. Not in a competitive way, but a way to help me learn. Did that make sense?
I like to be second.
I certainly don’t like to stand out either way.