Age 10

My 10-year-old daughter has become quite competent. A few weeks ago, I watched her in the kitchen, holding her little brother in one arm while fixing some food in another, and something old rose up inside me. I saw that she was capable of pulling her own weight and quite a bit more as well, and I evaluated her capabilities as rationally and eagerly as my husband evaluates tractors. This is a girl who can work, I told myself. This is a girl who can work for me. I didn’t like the way I was thinking about her, but I thought it anyway.

When I watch my girl, I often see family stories transposed upon her. I know that at age 10, my grandma’s oldest sister worked harder than I ever have. She cared for three young siblings and fixed the family’s main meals while her parents worked in the fields. I expect she did the work fairly well. At ten years old, my mother went trick or treating for the last time. Several months later, my grandma died, leaving my mother to take up the work of keeping house. Mom wouldn’t let me go trick or treating after the age of 10, because she expected that if she had done a good job as a parent, then I should be fairly grown up by that age. The first Halloween without trick or treating, I put on a leotard, painted wrinkles on my face with eyeliner and told the neighbor children who came to my door that I was dressed up as a dream deferred. I felt both jealous and superior.

My daughter and I are living out lives that our family members longed for. We have the precious education that my great aunt wanted so badly. We both have mothers who are alive and who love us like no one else can. Neither of us must work so hard that we have to leave part of ourselves behind before we’re ready. Even though I enjoy our privilege and take it for granted, I sometimes feel as though I’ve wandered out on untried ground, and I keep glancing back, trying to learn what strength we might be leaving behind.