Confucius, Stronger Certainly

My older one had her second sitting for SATs this morning.  I was up early and figured I’d be the one to drive her over to school.  I could head to the gym after I did so.  It’s one thing for parents to be stressed with work and life.  It’s a shame that kids must also share this rough conditioning.  She’d been so on edge all week, with mountains of International Baccalaureate school work and the standardized tests looming as well.  Today would be a release, if nothing else.

I got her up at 7:00AM.  “No.  7:30!”  Got it.  The test was at 8:00AM and I vacillated between wanting to let her make her own decisions and telling her she was going to be late.  My wife got up and went straight to the kitchen.  A reflective Confucian funny-bone was twitching somewhere in her conscious.  “My child is off this morning to write the Eight-Legged Essay.  I must prepare food for her.”

She had made some stir fry-like brain food the night before and now she was reheating it.  Turning to me with a look of dissatisfaction, she said: “Well, if you’re taking her you better get ready.”  I was dressed, with the car keys firmly in hand.  “Sure.  I’ll go turn the heat on in the car.” 

There are some things my wife believes to be true which are cultural traditions.  And other beliefs which are contemporary and syncretic.  Rules around children talking back to their parents, for example, is the prior.  The orthodoxy against food being taken here and there in plastic bags is properly an example of the latter.  Under no circumstances would my wife tolerate me or anyone under her roof presenting a bottle of wine to someone in a plastic bag.  Similarly, walking around with one’s lunch in such a clear plastic bag would be a high crime.  Mencius never needed to have weighed in on the matter.  It just is. 

And so it was with great surprise that I returned in from the car to see my wife loading up her stir fry into a rather common plastic bag with a spoon for my older one to bring to the test.  “Honey, that looks a little . . .”  “There’s no time!  She has to go.” She said, overriding my etiquette style-point, effortlessly.  Confucius, stronger certainly, in the heat of battle, than Ms. Manners.

Riding over I gave my daughter space.  What are you gonna say?  Something stupid, no doubt, like “do you think you’re ready?”  We passed a jianbing cart and I asked half heartedly if she’d like some.  To my surprise she said she did and I did a u-turn and gave her ten-kuai to get one for herself.  Now she had two plastic bags worth of food.  I politely suggested she finish whatever she was going to eat up before heading in, because the smell was rather pungent and might be an olfactory offence for the other test takers.   She absorbed this and darted off for the door with the jianbing bag in hand. 

Saturday 03/10/18