So the school year is wrapping up, and I find myself a middle aged woman. Well, OLDER than middle aged, according to the Pea during a recent car ride, “Mom, you’re not middle aged. Middle aged is 30, you’re way older than that.” Fortunately for the child, I was behind the wheel of an automobile at the time. As such, I was forced to remain responsible and keep driving forward with my eyes on the road and not, say, boring a hole into her head with “THE LOOK.” But I digress.
When the children relay their activities, I find myself saying, “Really? Well, in MY day…” (I’m serious, I truly catch myself saying that, and feeling as if I’m a grumpy old man complaining about having to walk uphill both ways, to school.) This week, my 9 year old dissected a frog. “Really? Well, in MY day we were sophomores in high school before we ever dissected a frog!” The Bug rolled her eyes. “Well, it’s not like we weren’t prepared Mom. I mean, we did a virtual frog dissection last Monday on our IPad. “Really? Well, in MY day we didn’t even imagine there would be such a thing as a personal computer!”
Anyhooo, in the interest of parental involvement, I volunteered to help supervise the whole “Frog Dissection” event. For anyone who knows me, this is a BIG deal. I don’t do blood. (See any of my previous blog posts, preferably August 2009’s “I Vant Yore Blood.”) However, I remembered from my sophomore year, oh so long ago, there isn’t any blood in a frog dissection. Lots of stinky formaldehyde, but no oozing blood. I felt sure I’d be a fine example for my child, who worried she’d feel too queasy to participate. “Oh, you’ll love it!” I gushed, “It’s so fascinating!” (In the interest of full disclosure, dear reader, you should be aware I uttered this encouragement in the dark while kissing the Bug goodnight, and she could not actually see my expression of terror).
I strolled into the classroom full of confidence. I put on protective gloves, I assisted the kids with their protective goggles, I even donned a lab coat. (Oh yeah, just how I roll.) I was fine handing out trays, I was fine handing out scalpels, and scissors. I was fine viewing the bag o’ frogs. (Literally, a ginormous zip-lock-ish bag full of dead frogs in a pool of chemical preservatives.) I developed a series of strategies, back up plans, as it were, should nausea enter the scene. First, I would look directly into my daughter’s eyes, and only into her eyes, when encouraging. Second, I would record the event with snapshots. Snapshots taken by holding the camera above my kid’s head and pointing only the lens down toward the frog. If all else failed, I would look across the room and pretend to be receiving further instructions from the teacher.
The little Bug sliced the frog’s skin down the middle of the torso, and pulled apart the sections. “LOOK MOM! There’s the heart! And the intestines!”
I look my daughter in the eyes, “Excellent! What’s next?”
“Mom, come closer, you’re standing too far away. Touch the frog!”
I excuse myself to the hallway and “help” some children get a drink of water. I chat with the passing teachers, parents, students, maintenance workers, basically any and all unlucky souls wandering by me on the third floor.
My gloved, goggled Bug peeks out the doorway, “MOM! You’re missing EVERYTHING!”
I slunk back inside the room, “How about some photographs of my little surgeon in training?”
“Take pictures of this heart,” tweezers with said heart shoved toward camera lens, “and the liver, and the stomach, and the intestines!” It would have been a miracle if anything was captured on film as my eyes were fixed on the ceiling. I figured it was about time to wrap things up. I went ahead and removed my gloves, my lab coat, tried to find my car keys.
“MOM! I did it! I got the brain out!” shouts my enraptured daughter. Tweezers in air, grasping tight to the frog’s membrane. Oh joy. I excused myself once again to the hall to “help” children get a drink of water.
Sure, the teachers saw right through me, as did the other parents present. But that’s OK. My little Bug knew I was there to support new endeavors. Baby steps in an honest effort to help my baby. To cheer as she explores where she will fit in when she grows up. Her role, contributing to human kind. Perhaps in a profession so very distant from what I would have ever attempted to accomplish. My little one, who is rapidly becoming more of a brain surgeon than a baby girl.
And maybe one afternoon, when my grown daughter instructs a class regarding the genetic intricacies of chromosomes, she’ll catch herself saying, “Really? Well, in my day, we performed lab work on frogs! And look how far we’ve come….”
