I'm glad I'm not a giraffe

Above: A gorgeous bowl made by my multi-talented friend Luisa. She took pottery classes a while back, and continues to experiment with different types of pottery.



On the weekend, our nieces came for a sleepover. During the visit, we went through some of Jeff's old childhood memorabilia, provided by his mom. The picture above is an excerpt from his "About Me" book. For the record, I'm glad Jeff isn't a giraffe, too.



Here, Jeff holds up an old school photo. My nieces could hardly believe this was Jeff. From my perspective, however, the photo seems pretty close to how I remember Jeff when I first met him. I can see the difference between then and now, of course, but the "essence of Jeff" remains the same.

We also went through some of his old report cards. I was pretty surprised by the teacher's comment at the bottom of Jeff's Grade 1 report card: "Jeff is a very bright, courteous, well-mannered boy. However, he has some very persistent nervous mannerisms, such as talking continually, blinking and rolling his eyes, and sticking his tongue into his cheek. He seems to be ashamed to cry. These problems appear to be deeply rooted."



Dear lord. I'm not a parent, but I can't help but feel this sort of comment is more appropriate to a parent-teacher interview than a written report. And what's the deal with the "these problems appear to be deeply rooted" remark? How can ANYTHING be "deeply rooted" in someone who is only in first grade? And geez, many kids (and adults) I know are embarrassed about crying in public. Ok, I'll stop ranting now.

I like Beckett's comment in Flickr:

"Heh. Sounds like every single Kindergarten boy that I know (and I know quite a few right now...). Tell Jeff if he were in my guys' classes now they would think he was really cool and want to be his friend...
Oh wait, they already think he's way cool."





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