Thirteen years ago, in the middle of a late blooming of
Cherry Blossoms (Sakura) in Yokosuka Japan, we brought home a 7 pound 8 ounce
baby girl. She arrived in a flurry of
pink and immediately wrapped both her parents around her tiny, perfect
finger. Dad especially fell victim to
this little pint sized doll baby and though we had kind of hoped for a boy, we
were okay with this little girl we had.
As she grew, she was all pink tights and leotards, a ballerina to the
core with all the grace and skill that would carry her quite a ways to keep up
with the big girls when given an opportunity.
She danced with the kind of passion and joy that she gives her life,
there was no wondering if Madison loved what she was doing, she glowed with
it. Did I lament that I had a girlie
girl and not a tomboy more like me?
No. Well maybe a little, but only
because I wasn’t sure what to do with all that pink, all this girl… but after
Sydney came along two years and four months after Madison – it was obvious that
I better start learning. Don’t get me
wrong, I had tea parties when I was little, and I had Barbie, but I also had
two older brothers and no one else to play with. So I was pretty good at football and once my
brother received a “Guns of Navarone” playset…Barbie became “Barb” in Camo and
took that hill over and over again complete with knives and guns she swiped
from GI Joe while he was sleeping. But
those are stories for another day…
So we had these two dancing little girls…but we still had
this tomboy mom, and as luck would have it…Madison’s ability to dance just
meant she also has a natural ability for movement, and she soon was tearing up
the field playing football, and then the courts with Basketball and then
Volleyball, finally. Hurray, something I
knew how to teach her. Somewhere in
there a really talented artist emerged, and writer, but surprising to me was
the mathematician and scientist that are in there too. How can she be so unlike me? She has my eyes, my love for Volleyball and
she has double my brain. She loves Math
and Science more than she does writing and reading, but she loves both of those
in pretty good measure too. She’s a
pretty all around intelligent kid and we truly believe that common sense will
surely follow in the path, eventually.
Back at the beginning of the year sometime,
Madison’s Math teacher saw something special in her and nominated her for a
special summer camp at UCSD. The
nomination was the easy part, after that Madison had to complete an application
and write an essay in order to be considered.
From there, she pushed forward to an Interview process. It was odd sitting there and watching her
talk her way through questions and try to express who she is and what she is
about to two complete strangers. I felt
like she was six years old again and being interviewed by Japanese Producers who
were considering her for television commercials or magazine ads. I would sit quietly, letting her fumble with
grace through the rigors of selling herself to them. I did the same in these interviews. When she got too far away from talking about
herself, they brought her back to talking about her and not the greatness of
another friend. After the interview we
had to broach the potential of a move, would she be considered? Turns out they were willing to consider her
if we were willing to bring her to San Diego if she were to be chosen. I told them of course, but expected that she
wouldn’t be considered because of the move.
Turns out they saw something pretty special in my daughter.
The day before Easter, she received a letter of
Congratulations that she had been chosen.
She cried. And her utter joy
touched my heart; I had no idea to what depth she had wanted this so
badly. Something that I felt she thought
would be fun was something she had been truly hoping for, recognizing this in
that moment as I held her; I had a few misty tears myself. But then we knew I was a big mushy baby
anyway. So come summer, my kiddo is
spending a week in the dorm at UCSD, learning and absorbing a world of math and
science as taught by other incredibly gifted, intelligent and successful women
in the world of STEM. An opportunity to
take part in a camp designed for seventh grade girls that encourage them to
pursue futures in STEM: Science, Technology, Engineering and Math. And my daughter is so excited she wants to
start packing right now. It’s a world I
know very little about, but one that both my daughters might spend their lives
in…and I couldn’t be prouder. So yet
again, I have some learning to do so I can make sure that come Holiday dinners
I can understand and maybe say at least one intelligent thing back. Or… I’ll throw pumpkin pie on the menu, then
no one talks all that much anyway. ;-)
So we spent Saturday in traffic traveling hours back and
forth from San Diego, and though the traffic sucked and we were exhausted at
the end of the day and honestly, into Sunday, it was so worth the trip. She managed to contain her seat, barely, and when they took the group picture, my little pale haired sunshine glowed from the middle of the group. And as Eric leaned over and whispered in my ear: “You
realize she’s going to come home from this camp completely different.” I had to
pause as I thought about it. He’s mostly
right, she will. She will be older and more mature, but if she
truly loves any of these potential topics, her world will rotate to a passionate
pursuit that will be deterred by no one the moment she decides to put the full
force of her will towards it. And that
alone will be something to behold.
Congratulations Kiddo! Your mom and dad are so proud of you! And we promise, we will extract your envious little sister from your suitcase as soon as we drop you off at your dorm room!
