Another Life

It's a wonderful little family over there in that split-level house. Dad, Mom, and the three boys. Life is busy, bound to get busier, and so far so good. It's a day-to-day kind of life, moment to moment even, and I think that makes it hard to remember past life. But there was one.

So here's a small reminder of days gone by, from the Berkeley years, for my daughter.

Ann, the SAT Tutor, Speaks About Her Student

“Mom,” she said, “I think this student of mine might be a cow.”

I pictured a fat girl.

“I don’t mean he’s fat. I mean he responds to me the way I think a cow might.”

Oh, it’s a boy. I pictured a boy with a round face and big eyes. Who chews.

“No matter what I say to him, he just looks at me. Doesn’t say anything, just looks.”

“Does he chew?” I asked.

“Well, yes, he does.”

My daughter tutors high school seniors preparing to take the SAT. She drives to their homes, spends an hour and a half with each one, then goes home. She has several students, so she does this four or five days a week. After the first few sessions with a student, she usually likes the kid—boy or girl—and likes the teaching, too. But this one, the one she thinks might be a cow, she doesn’t know if she can like him.

“For instance,” she said. “The other day we were working on grammar. I asked him to look at his book and read the first two sentences aloud. He just looked at me. Didn’t move or turn his head for a long time. Finally, he did turn his head and he did look at the book but he didn’t read, and I had to say again ‘out loud, please.’ That’s like a cow, isn’t it? I mean if I said to a cow, ‘Go over there; go on,’ it might. But it might not.”

By now I was laughing hard. So was she, but she said, “You know, Mom, he frustrates me because it’s very hard to know if I’m getting anywhere. Besides, every week I have to ask him about his homework, and I do. But he just looks at me. So I'm worried that when he takes the exam and doesn’t do very well his parents will think they didn’t get their money’s worth.”

“Well," I said, "you may have to tell them."

"Yeah," she said. "It’s because their son is a cow.”