The Child at Home : Part 4

The American Child
by Elizabeth McCracken

(Page 5 of 13)

That mother was her little girl's confidential friend as well as her mother. The child, quite unreservedly, told her what she wanted and why she wanted it. It was no weak indulgence of a child's whim, but a genuine respect for another person's rights as an individual - even though that individual was merely a little child - that led that mother to allow her daughter to have what she wanted. May not some subtle sense of this have been the basis of the child's happiness in the fulfillment of her desire? She wanted to go to dancing-school because the other children were going; but may she not have liked going because she felt that her mother understood and sympathized with her desire to go?

A Frenchwoman to whom I once said that American parents treat their children in many ways as though they were their contemporaries remarked, "But does that not make the children old before their time?"

So far from this, it seems, on the contrary, to keep the parents young after their time. It has been truly said that we have in America fewer and fewer grandmothers who are "sweet old ladies," and more and more who are "charming elderly women." We hear less and less about the "older" and the "younger" generations; increasingly we merge two, and even three, generations into one.

Only yesterday, calling upon a new acquaintance, I heard the four-year- old boy of the house, mentioning his father, refer to him as "Henry."

His grandmother smiled, and his mother said, casually: "When you speak of father, dear, it would be better to say, 'my father,' so people will be sure to know whom you mean. You may have noticed that grandma always says, 'my son,' and I always say 'my husband,' when we speak of him."

"Does he call his father by his Christian name?" I could not resist questioning, when the little boy had left the room.

"Sometimes," replied the child's mother.

"He hears so many persons do it, he can't see why he shouldn't. And there really is no reason. Soon enough he will find out that it isn't customary and stop doing it."

This is a far cry from the days when children were taught to address their parents as "honored sir" and "respected madam." But, it seems to me, the parents are as much honored and respected now as then; and - more important still - both they and the children are, if not dearer, yet nearer one another.

In small as well as in large matters they slip into their parents' places - neither encouraged nor discouraged, but simply accepted. Companions and friends, they behave as such, and are treated in a companionable and friendly manner.

The other afternoon I dropped in at tea-time for a glimpse of an old friend.

Her little girl came into the room in the wake of the tea-tray. "Let me pour the tea," she said, eagerly.

"Very well," her mother acquiesced. "Be careful not to fill the cups too full, so that they overflow into the saucers; and do not forget that the tea is hot" she supplemented.

The little girl had never poured the tea before, but her mother neither watched her nor gave her any further directions. The child devoted herself to her pleasant task. With entire ease and unconsciousness she filled the cups, and made the usual inquiries as to "one lump, or two?" and "cream or lemon?"

"Isn't she rather young to pour the tea?" I suggested, when we were alone.

"I don't see why," my friend said. "There isn't any 'age limit' about pouring tea. She does it for her dolls in the nursery; she might just as well do it for us here. Of course it is hot; but she can be careful."

There are few things in regard to the doing or the saying or the thinking of which American parents apprehend any "age limit." Their children are not "tender juveniles." They do not have a detached life of their own which the parents "share," nor do the parents have a detached life of their own which the children "share." There is the common life of the home, to which all, parents and children, and often grandparents too, contribute, and in which they all "share."

This is the secret of that genuine satisfaction that so many of us grown-ups in America find in the society of children, whether they are members of our own families or are the children of our friends and neighbors.