When Your Daughter Isn't Turning Into You, But You're Turning Into Your Mother

And by you, of course I mean me.

So here's the story as it has been told to me over the years. For reasons that were undoubtedly religiously motivated, my mom decided she was going to home school my brother and me. She started with Jesse at whatever early age because he was reading in the womb and dividing cheerios in his highchair and blah, blah, blah. It was so much fun and he was so smart and remember the time he related the word sequel to the Back to the Future series?! What a genius! What pure joy to watch this child learn!

And then I came along. There are no stories about my great mental prowess, my clever anecdotes. There is only one story. The story that ends quite abruptly at, "And then I enrolled you both in school." Thinking on it now, I'm not sure we can even call it a story. It's really just a crude reenactment of a poor young child struggling to read the word bug. "B-U-G. B-U-G. You kept saying the sounds, but you just couldn't put them together. B-U-G. It was so maddening! I couldn't work with it! And then I enrolled you both in school."

Now you may be thinking, "At least you got into the school system! Your lack of skills saved you from a life of awkwardness and thinking the answer to every hard question is: because that's the way God made it." And that would be true if my parents hadn't found a religious school filled with teachers whose only qualifications seemed to be how well they wielded a ruler. Could they use it to smack you smartly across the tush? Very good. Could they use it to measure that your gym shorts fell exactly two inches above the knee? Excellent. Could they tuck it in between two books (Bibles) on a shelf in the library (of Bibles) to mark where they'd taken one [Bible] out? Hired!

Despite my ruler-centric primary education, I did eventually learn to read. The Bible first, of course. But then other things. Things not written in the King James' English. And I grew to love reading. I love it so much I currently belong to two book clubs. Ask me if I have time to belong to two book clubs. I do not. That's how much I love reading. I will stay up all night to read a book I'm not sure I even like because I enjoy the act of reading itself just as much as I enjoy a good story.

Ayana enjoys a good story too, but she's more a fan of the oral tradition. She likes to tell a good story. Only it's not usually a good story. It's usually a pretty bad story, actually. She doesn't seem to understand story arc or conflict at all. Nor does she have any sense of pacing. You can be held hostage for many more minutes than you technically have to find out that absolutely nothing happened. Like watching a flat line on a heart monitor. I'm working with her on it; but I assure you she does not give one single hoot about my storytelling or writing credentials.

And much to my horror, she gives even fewer hoots for reading. Zero hoots given. She isn't incapable. She doesn't have any recognizable learning disabilities according to her teachers (who are very savvy about these things). She really just does not care. When asked what her damn deal is, she says, "It's not fun like math." Excuse me, what? On what planet has math ever been fun? Maybe on planet Gigi, who used to tell me as I cried over my algebra homework, "Math is a game!" Bullshit math is a game.

You know what's actually a game? Racing with time to beat Nancy Drew at solving the Mystery of the Moonstone Castle. Trying on the sorting hat and discovering you're a Ravenclaw? That's a game. Four plus seventeen equals twenty-one is a fact. Taking respite on the veranda with Fancy Nancy is a game.

But of course life is not. We do not get to stack the deck in favor of one skill over another. We get the kid we get and she decides on her own whether or not math is fun. And thank goodness for that, right? I mean, where would NASA be without brilliant black women who decided to love math, despite all the opposition?

No matter how good she gets with her figures, I'm not sure I'll ever be totally chill about Ayana's lack of enthusiasm for learning to read. I'm sure I'll keep pushing her a little too enthusiastically until she learns just to get me off her back. And I'm fine with that. A little pushing is part of the job. Pushing your kids off to school when you've done the best you can do. Pushing them to finish their homework when they'd rather play outside. Pushing them to set up a foundation that will serve them well in their educational endeavors.

And someday in our distant future, much like my mother I'll struggle to hide my glee when she comes crying to me that her own baby won't read. I'll tell her it's in her genes, and we'll have a good laugh about that. We love making genes jokes. I'll remind her of the epic battles we had over words like "or" and "that." And maybe I'll comfort her by telling her Yadon girls start slow, but they don't stay there. No matter how I handle that moment when it comes, I imagine I'll be smiling because I know the story has a happy ending. Everyone turns into her mother eventually.