Confidence

 

I sat back today and thought what a wonderful thing to have all the assertiveness of a child. By assertiveness, I mean the total confidence that my daughter carries off as she tells me, for the umpteenth time, that I am wrong. This is despite asking me the question in the first place. I can’t remember exactly what the question as she was in a questioning mood this afternoon and in a half hour car journey, she must have asked approximately 50 questions. These questions ranged from the mundane; why do we have to go to school? to the more complex; why do we have to get old? In truth, I’m pretty sure my answers to some of these questions were probably insufficient but it was the absolute surety in which she informed me that I was wrong that took me by surprise. Of course, when I asked her what she thought was the answer to all these questions, she just shrugged and looked out the window and replied, “I don’t know but I’ll guess I find out sometime.” I was stunned into silence.

Of course, I shouldn’t be too surprised by this behaviour. She is her mother’s daughter. Her mother being the person who would, on a long journey, confidently declare that the sat nav was bringing us the wrong way. When asked what the right way is, she would stubbornly protest that she didn’t know the way but that this was definitely the wrong way. I think I am doomed to lose every battle with those two.

Meanwhile, our extension is going well and my son is loving every minute of it. His go to morning routine is to push a chair that is twice as big as him up towards the kitchen window so he can look out the window. Next, he will proudly declare, “Daddy, look, a digger!” The digger has been there for two weeks and this has happened every morning. What’s more, the hint of shock in his voice has not diminished over the course of those two weeks. He will then declare that the digger is blue. The digger is actually green but I have learned not to argue with him as he will fight tooth and nail with anyone that disagrees with him. This all happens before the crazy turn he takes where he runs into the kitchen, spins around in circles and then runs out again, taking the contents of the toy kitchen with him. I know I mentioned this last time, but I cannot emphasise enough how annoying it is. While my son loves the entire building process and especially the machinery, our dog is having some trouble adjusting to the mayhem outside. Each morning, he greets the arrival of our builders with a menacing growl and a bark that would make even the bravest person shiver. Of course, in order for that to happen that person would have to not know our dog because anyone that did know him would know that he is anything but menacing. He would run out to the edge of the makeshift fence that separates the garden from the building work all powerful and strong. Our builder, who knows him well, and clearly dislikes dogs, will reply with “shut up, shit”. To which, our brave guard dog would skulk back indoors to his bed, defeated, and remain there for quite some time. I guess what I am saying is that confidence, even unfounded confidence is an amazing this. It can make you believe you are the fearsome guardian of a household, the purveyor of the knowledge that all questions of life are not answered by your imbecile dad, or that green is actually blue. Whatever it is that gives these kids, and the dog, the confidence to do what they do, I want it but most of all I want to make sure they never lose it. I may want to make sure they get a stronger grip on reality though, that digger is definitely green!