Mary in 1,000,000 words or less

As I mentioned in a previous post, we had homework assignment where we were to write an essay "in 1,000,000 words or less" about Mary for her teacher. This is what Kitty wrote. I thought you'd all enjoy it.

Dear Susan,

David and I could go on for quite awhile about Mary, so we are glad that you’ve given us wide berth to describe her, but we think we can abide by the guidelines and come in under a million words.

Mary is the tender heart in our family, and we love her for it. The first time she watched Charlotte’s Web was with my sister several years ago. We were at work. My sister ended up calling me to give me a read out on Mary. She sobbed uncontrollably when Charlotte died and Wilbur was left without his savior and friend. She is incredibly close with my sister, and my sister is a librarian in a school, so she talked to Mary for a long time about the book and about the friendship between Fern and Wilbur and between Charlotte and Wilbur. Mary asked if they could go up to her room and lay on her bed so they could cry together. My sister said they lay together for about a half hour before Mary could stop the tears.

We’ve comforted her during similar episodes when E.T. and Elliot say good-bye and when Willy swims free. When she says good-bye to my sister after seeing her, she sometimes just wells up. Other times, she cries and cries and laments between sobs, “I just lover her so much that I can’t stop crying.” When people tell her that they love her, she can become totally overwhelmed.

Mary is very family oriented. She is a great big sister, and she loves our little family as well as her large extended family, especially her Noni and Papa, Auntie Caroline, and Grandma and Grandpa. She is generous with love in both giving and receiving it. We often say to Mary, “to know you is to love you.” Perhaps because she is the oldest grandchild on David’s side and because she is named after my mom, and for various other reasons, she seems to hold a special place in the hearts of different members of our family.

While we mostly adore this trait in Mary, I guess the down side is that her emotions can run high and can get the best of her. If she feels left out or jilted by someone in a social situation, she can become extremely forlorn.

Mary’s a bit of a split on being outgoing on one day, and shy on another. It depends on the situation and her comfort level. On her first day of nursery school, I thought it would be really hard, but she jumped out of the car and ran into the school and barely looked back. On her first day this year, she confided to me that she was nervous and wanted to make sure both of us were going to school with her and wanted to know if we would walk into the building ahead of her.

Maybe because of intermittent bouts of shyness, she often surprises us with her sense of adventure. She is not afraid of water and probably because she had no fear, she learned to swim early and go off diving boards and jump off the sides of boats and go tubing and ride wave runners. Our babysitter describes her as the kid who makes her heart skip a beat. She rides scooters and bikes fast and likes to add little dangerous elements by doing stuff like swerving around her little sister to create a near miss. She likes to climb as high as she can in trees.

Mary will be incredibly active if the occasion presents itself. She can also be an incredible slug if given the opportunity. She loves TV, but we limit how much she watches, which can cause some incredible mood swings. In fact, I think TV causes bad behavior in Mary, so I like to avoid it when possible. During the school year, we try to abide by a policy of no TV during the week. We let her watch a movie on Friday night and some TV on Saturday and Sunday each.

I feel like until age 5, Mary was an incredibly even kid. Among our group of friends who have kids the same age, we could all count on Mary to be a stabilizing force among a big group of kids – having fun with the kids her age, but looking out for the littler kids. We could nearly always expect a positive reaction from her to the activity or task at hand. In the last year, she has been more moody – sometimes quite grumpy. We find ourselves engaged in a battle of the wills with her more often – about not watching TV, what to eat or when, when to go to bed. My guess is that while she likes to test David and me on what she can or cannot get away with, she is more obedient with other authority figures. (One of my other sisters, whose birthday is one day before Mary and who shares the Taurus zodiac sign, laughs about Mary being obedient and says it’s a Taurus trait.)

Mary is smart and likes the challenge of learning things, figuring things out, reaching those a-ha moments when things make sense. She seems to do well with math. She can read small books, but still prefers by far to have us read to her. She has an incredible memory which may just be typical of kids this age, but we marvel at it. We hope it serves her in an academic setting.

We find it hard to write this because we are so head-over-heels in love with Mary that there is clearly no objectivity. She has brought us immeasurable joy and has made us better people just by being our kid. We swell with pride over her. Her run at being a good kid far exceeds our attempt at being good parents to her. Yet, she seems no worse for wear. We are pretty confident she will enjoy first grade because of all of the new things she will discover and because of her ability to grasp more and more. She loves Grace and the kids in her class. We hope you enjoy having her in your class and look forward to discussions with you about how school is going and how Mary is progressing in first grade. We are so pleased with her experience at Grace and the environment there. We feel it is a great fit for Mary.

Kind regards,

Kitty and David