Abacus and Quill

My frustrated child sat at the table the other day and bowed her head. “I’m so stupid!”

My giggling back-up-daughter* sat next to me in the car and exclaimed, “I’m so blonde sometimes.”

I gave them both the same advice. “Be careful of the names you call yourself, especially if it’s a name you wouldn’t let anyone else call you!” The names we call ourselves create psychic grooves – ruts for your thoughts to flow. Better they should flow to more positive things, like smart, lovely, wonderful, thoughtful, strong, talented, giving… you get the idea.

Now, give them their due, the 7-year-old and the 13-year-old both offered the same basic response of the slow eye roll and the silent “whatever”.  Why should they listen to me? What could I possibly know? But it’s worth exploring. What are we calling ourselves, and what do these names say to us, about us and for us?

Abacus & Quill.

My sister chose ‘Abacus’ because it’s somehow representative of her. Our discussion about what to call the blog was quick. She knew she wanted to use Abacus and I immediately came to ‘Quill’ for myself because of how I see myself in comparison to her. As the younger sister, I’ve never NOT thought of myself in comparison to her in one way or another, and literally, I am Quill because she IS Abacus. She’s all math-y and smart, and I’m the writer – the creative, arty, frothy, flighty one. Each of us also shares the qualities of the other, but I definitely created that groove of myself as the writer long ago and have been flowing in it ever since.

All in all, it’s a good groove that has served me well. Though I wonder how much of my identity is wrapped up in “reaction to/different from”. Bears further thought. I’ll be back to this later.

*I realize not everyone has back up kids, but I do. In addition to my own two girls, for the past five years, I’ve been backup mom to my friend’s two girls and a boy, while she plays backup for my girls. Much of the time, all five kids enjoy the benefits of our sometimes communal family, and having a BUM (as the oldest calls me) and their own backup sibs. It’s a good arrangement for the mom’s and the dad’s have come to embrace it too. We figure, the more people that have your back, the better. More on this later too.

kids and backup kids @ the beach