Enough about my pseudo-erudite reading, I hear you cry: what about the children?
Right now, they are in Italy with Isa, where I’ll be joining them next week. All reports are good: Lola was in her own personal heaven yesterday when she went off with Zia Dedi to make ice-cream; Neve is pathologically happy these days and geographical dislocation hasn’t affected that. They are both sharing a bed at Nonna’s house, which Isa says they are really enjoying. Apparently, they are also managing to sleep. Eventually. When they’re tired of enjoying.
The other day, I went to play my guitar for Lola’s class. It was science week, and they were looking at the science of music. They all (both reception classes) sat on the floor around me and listened while I ran through some key guitar facts; then we all sang Twinkle Twinkle Little Star; then I sang GI Blues; and we finished off with a bit of the “you hum it, I’ll play it” style of ad hoc song accompaniment. It was really great fun. The kids were attentive, inquisitive, friendly and generally great fun to be around. It makes one quite envious of a primary school teacher’s job (financial aspect aside).
What else? Well, in general, Lola has been going through a bit of an emotional-knife-edge stage: everything is lovely while life proceeds as she would dictate but, the moment a hint of “no” appears she is thrown into a fit of wailing and grief that would befit a world-ending catastrophe. Of course, one cannot give up the saying of “No” but remaining calm and applying sensible measures in the face of such exaggerated responses is far from easy.
Neve’s problem inhabits the opposite pole: the word “No” means nothing to her; you may apply it as liberally as you like but she will continue to beat Lola about the head, or pour rice onto the floor, or thieve yummy yum-yums from the cupboard. It’s hard to know what to do; the current decision is that we remove her to a separate room (perhaps the bottom of the stairs), have a serious talk with her (until she stops laughing), and then leave her there, explaining why. She doesn’t stay, of course, and we couldn’t enforce that; but it does get the point through. We think.
I should point out that, though I’ve picked out a couple of negative points for both girls, the negative is not dominant: they are both wonderful, happy, loving girls who bring us a great deal of joy and pride.