You can tell a lot about a child by watching him blow bubbles. Yesterday, I gave the boys bubbles – the kind with the long wand and the tall, test-tube like bottle.
Ben dips his wand carefully, and withdraws it slowly to preserve the delicate window of soap. He blows slowly and carefully, producing a number of medium and small size bubbles. Then, Ben laughs with delight as he gently tries to capture one or two on his wand. He does this repeatedly, with a smile.
Evan, on the other hand, dips his wand with force and swirls the liquid soap in the jar. Then he pulls his wand out with the flourish of a samurai unsheathing his sword. Naturally, this results in the soap window popping before he can blow bubbles. I try to demonstrate the prerequisite skill of dipping your wand, but Evan must do it his way a few more times before he decides I may just know something about this activity.
Evan then attempts to produce bubbles by blowing with the force needed to extinguish all the candles on a septuagenarian’s birthday cake. This produces another fail. He defaults to another method of waving the wand madly back and forth which is at once both dangerous (if you are standing near him) and ineffective – unless you want to count the small lathering of mini-bubbles this produces.
I try once again to show Evan how to do this – but he won’t hand me his bubbles. Then, he hands me his bubbles, but not to watch me……Evan has decided that something is obviously wrong with his bubbles, so he is going to take Ben’s away from him. I block this maneuver and make Evan watch as I blow bubbles from his perfectly-fine wand. Then, I blow slowly and softly on his hand. Next, I blow with force and make the sign for “bad.” A light bulb goes on, and Evan – being Evan – snatches the bubbles back from me and attempts to put his new found knowledge to work, with varying degrees of success. He is happy and blows bubbles for several minutes. Till he is bored. And then he pours his bubbles out on the sidewalk. Deliberately.
The account above stands as a microcosm of the past several days with Evan. We have had some fun, too – lunch with my oldest best friend, Carolyn and her Mom yesterday. Evan truly enjoyed himself especially since we went to a wonderful Chinese restaurant.
We visited a lovely playground/park with Andrea and her sweet and handsome son Roc. Ben and Evan ran up and down all the playground equipment and had a blast. Roc is a little younger (3) and enjoyed the sand box. A little girl from their library group soon joined the fun. Evan did mostly well, but requires close-proximity-supervision to make sure he doesn’t push someone or violate other rules of friendly play.
We visited my grandmother, who was a nurse all of her life but would have rather been a teacher. She pulled out paper, scissors and glue sticks. Grandma showed Evan how to make a paper chain. Evan impressed us all by making a paper mouse complete with tail and ears!
Our pace seems to be three steps forward, two steps back. Evan is a quick learner; he is just not convinced he has much to learn. At times, he is kind to his new brother Ben – and other times he is aggressive and pushes or hits. Evan has undoubtedly acquired many skills in his years at the orphanage. Very few of these skills are necessary or effective in his new life. That, understandably, produces frustration for Evan – and for his new Mommy.
We are taking one day at a time. Yesterday evening, Evan still had energy to burn so I took him for his first ride on the gorgeous Loof carousel near my mother’s house. It is a grand display of artistry – the horses are all hand carved with real horse-hair tails. They are large and move at a fast speed compared to the dinky carousels you are likely to find in most kiddie-land ride parks. There is a fantastic calliope in the center that produces raucous fair music with moving cherubs blowing trumpets and beating drums. I marvel each time I visit. Evan was delighted and picked the biggest and highest horse. I climbed up into the saddle with him. Evan’s eyes were wide with excitement and he pumped his fist shouting (something?) as we made our first ride. I wondered whom he thought we were going to conquer. In the intermission between rides, Evan pretended to pick our stallion’s nose …and eat it.
I know many of my parent-friends are laughing. You all know how good I’ve had it for the past six years with Ben, a model child. I find myself thinking back to my own childhood – about the messes, spats, and frustration that 4 very different siblings generated for my mother. (I am sending her name in for canonization.)
I have evolved to the point in my life where I understand everything is exactly as it is meant to be. I’m sure that we will all learn a lot from each other. In time, I expect Evan will learn new skills that will serve him well in his new life. In the meantime, I plan to do what a wise friend of mine once counseled, “Allow for the effect of time, over time.” And remember to laugh!
(Below, Evan demonstrates his creation of paper hair - easily affixed with a glue stick. Mom's dog Sophie models the hair, along with her incredible tolerance, LOL.)
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