What Will Society Do To My Sweet and Sensitive Son?
I already see what it’s doing to my fierce and prickly daughter
About halfway through the movie, my son put his arm around his friend’s shoulder. His friend did the same. They sat there like that for a good 15 minutes, their arms loosely draped around one another’s shoulders, their legs dangling, their feet not quite touching the floor.
I glanced at his friend’s mother, and we both instinctively placed our hands on our hearts. Partly because it was so adorable — two boys expressing human affection for one another, understanding that it feels nice when someone has an arm around their shoulder, and not yet caring what gender that person is or if they will get teased.
My heart felt full, but it also hurt. My son has always been cuddly. He still likes to sit on my lap, even though it’s becoming increasingly hard for him to comfortably arrange his lanky eight-year-old body in it.
His disposition is naturally gentle and sweet. He’s a formidable opponent on the basketball court or soccer field, but his aggression is playful, not mean. He loves to giggle, begs to be tickled, and doesn’t mind spilling some tears if he gets hurt or things don’t go his way.
Our society is brimming with sweet and sensitive boys like my son. They smell warm and slightly yeasty, like rising bread dough. Their eyes are bright, their laughter bubbly.
I often find myself thinking, “Where do they all go?”
Sure, there are the physical changes that await boys during puberty. They start to smell. Their laughter deepens, their voices crack. And as they become more conscious of self, they also become more self-conscious. There are things they are no longer “supposed” to do, even if they want to. Cry, for one. Hug their mothers. Put their arm around another boy’s shoulder at the movie theater.
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Society is also full of fierce and prickly girls like my daughter. I’ve written extensively about her journey into adolescence — the startling loss of confidence, the all-consuming desire to be perceived as beautiful.
I’ve had to be intentional about rekindling her ferocity, which these days seems to be mostly directed at me when I make absurd suggestions, like that she hang up her towel before it mildews. But she’s no longer fierce amongst kids her own age. She hangs back, stays on the sidelines. She’s desperately afraid of embarrassing herself — or, what’s more likely, of me embarrassing her. The list of things I do to embarrass her includes: walking next to her in public, talking to her in public, and pretty much walking or talking in public, period.
Last year, I signed her up for basketball (forced her to do basketball, in her words) in a desperate attempt to salvage that fierce, fuck-it-all spirit that I saw the moment she first opened her bottomless black eyes. When she decides to put her heart into it, she shines on the basketball court — as I knew she would.
Anyone who wants to make the boneheaded argument that girls are “naturally” caring and boys are “naturally” aggressive should watch a 6th-grade girls’ basketball game. Watch a girl try to wrest the ball from an opposing girl’s arms, look at her face as she yanks, wrenches, and tugs.
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