Parenting has some tasks that are foundational, it seems to me. Instilling a sense of trust is one, as developmental experts have been telling us for years.
My own mother said that every child needs at least one adult in their life who thinks they are perfect. She and Pop saw that as their job as parents and grand-parents. Maybe more so as grand-parents! She also would add that children needed to eat a certain amount of dirt every day to grow up and be normal. I never knew what the “certain amount” really was. I think her point was that children should not be watched over too carefully.
Which was true in my own childhood. I was turned loose to play at a very early age, especially in the summers. I recall hearing people ask Mom about that, being incredulous that she had no idea where I was. “Oh, she’ll come home when it gets dark or she gets hungry,” she would say. “But what if something happens to her?” they would counter. “The dog will come get me,” was Mom’s answer. I now know that somebody in our tiny town knew where we were all the time. It takes a community to raise a child. Another foundational principle I think.
The Young Mother Abroad by Janny Scott, NY Times Magazine, April 24, 2011 is a wonderful article about President Obama’s mother, Stanley Ann Dunham. Much has been written about his father, especially by the President himself so this article is a nice addition to the picture of his childhood. It talks about her instilling in him a sense of respect for himself and others; self-confidence; a love of learning; and curiosity about the world. All foundational principles in my book. This quote below, which concludes the article, sums it all up for me too:
“As it was,” the author of the article writes, “she gave him the single most important gift a parent can give.” In Mr. Obama’s words, she gave me “a sense of unconditional love that was big enough that, with all the surface disturbances of our lives, it sustained me, entirely.”
