Learning from Each Other

I thought nobody would read my blog until Sienna is big enough to read. I thought Mrs T and a couple of others were the only people who would ever leave comments to encourage my diligence in blogging.

As it turned out, somebody else did in fact read it and decided to do something else about it. A writer for a national publication, a Canadian magazine similar to V-o-g-u-e, approached me last week. She is doing a piece about how grown-up/older women learn from little girls, i.e., a 4 to 13- year-old youngster as their neighbour, student or daughter. We might identify certain good qualities in a young person and reclaim them for our own self-improvement.

There is much talk about how we parents teach our kids. In reality, I always say that my daughter Sienna has been teaching me things from the very beginning of her life. Only now, somebody came along, attempting to look at how such "reversed teaching" takes place. We might be one of a few pairs to be interviewed and photographed for that topic.

It doesn't matter if we will ever show up on a magazine. Interesting enough just to have the topic brought up. One might assume, courage, honesty and self-confidence are the common things that we had and lost along way as we grow old and older. But balance in particular is what i have been learning from Sienna. Is it something that comes with maturity and that you would learn typically from a person much older than yourself?

I tend to take care of the needs of others until one day I realize that I also have needs. I hurt others while I try everything possible to please them. I get hurt by others. And not to mention that I hurt myself from time to time.

Sienna, on the other hand, has such a balance or poise when it comes to the give and take in life. She has what I call "an old soul" qualities in her. As a teacher of hers pointed out in a report that Sienna is extremely aware of herself, others and her environment, all at the same time.

The stories emerged and my blog repeats this theme again and again. Daddy says, "Oh, that's because you love her." Needless to say that I do love her to death. But I would rather think this is my objective observation of her characteristic traits. At least I have her teacher's report to back up my accessment. In any case, that's what I see myself learning from her tremendously so that I can better teach her.