The Joy(?) of Parenting

To Kill A Mockingbird ... probably one of my favorite books - and movies - of all time. I read it for the first time in grade four. My older cousins had realized by this time that I not only liked to read, but was also gifted in the art of the book report, so I was enlisted to read the book and write a book report.

I enjoyed the book very much, and managed to catch an airing of the movie a short time after reading it. Seeing the movie made me go back and read the book again, to compare the two and find all the inevitable differences. I still tend to do that, it's how I discovered I was really a Tolkien purist after the release of The Lord of the Rings trilogy by New Line.

I also remember that my teacher that year, Mrs. O'Keefe, discovered I was reading the book and felt it inappropriate for my age. She called my parents to inform them of this inappropriate behaviour, and to ask them to discourage it. I can only imagine her reaction when my father laughed at her and made it clear I could read whatever I damn well wanted. One of the few good things the old man ever did.

I'm getting off track though. To Kill A Mockingbird is one of those books that I go back and re-read at least once a year, usually after I've caught the movie on TV, and my last visit with Jem and Scout and Atticus was a little less than two months ago. I watched the film with my daughters (aged 12 and 14). The younger one enjoyed the film, the older one was bored but watched anyway. Both of them looked down their nose at me when I pulled the book off the shelf the next day and set about reaquainting myself with an old friend. They're both avid readers, something for which I am eternally grateful, but my choice of books apparently wasn't to their taste.

This past Friday, the older one came home with her very own copy of To Kill a Mockingbird. She made her displeasure quite clear and insisted she was reading it only because she had to, and if she could figure out a way to get through Freshman English without actually reading the book, she would. I listened and nodded in all the right places and made appropriate sympathetic sounds where needed, then told her to get started on her reading.

Her assignment for Monday was to read through Chapter 9, and she argued that she'd never be able to read that far because the book was so awful. But she sat down with the book this afternoon and forced her way into it. Somewhere near the end of Chapter 4 she was willing to admit that maybe the book wasn't as bad as she'd first thought. At the beginning of Chapter 9 she reminded herself that the instructions were to not read ahead; she had to stop at the end of the chapter and not go any further. She went to bed half an hour ago, and I'm told she has only 3 more chapters to go before she finishes the book. Once she really does finish, I'm going to have to rent the movie for her. Or maybe I should just buy it once and for all; let it sit on the shelf with the book to be taken out when I'm in the mood to revisit an old friend.

Why am I rambling about #2 child and To Kill a Mockingbird? As the monsters get older (and I say monster with the utmost love and affection), and develop their own tastes and personalities, I see less and less of myself in them. The older ones especially are coming into their own and I worry that I haven't given them the skills and the guidance that they'll need as they approach adulthood. But every once in a while, like today, I find a little bit of me in their choices and decisions, and I think that maybe I haven't been such a bad parent after all.

So here's to To Kill A Mockingbird, one more thing for a monster and I to bond over.