Maybe it’s because he was born six weeks early and was late on all the milestones that we indulge every one of his new skills with such saccharine enthusiasm, or maybe it’s because he’s the youngest and we’re always a little worried he’ll feel lost in the shadow of his precocious older brother. Maybe it’s because he has a gentle spirit and I am already heartsick at the thought that it will inevitably suffer some devastating blows as he ventures ever farther from hand-holding distance. 

The true motives behind my enthusiasm that day ultimately don’t matter much. What matters is that my kid had finally learned how to skip, and he was rightfully, adorably, exhaustingly boastful about this. He spent the car ride home from school recounting how many times he skipped across the blacktop at recess, how high his highest skips had been, how fast his fastest burst had been, who had witnessed this feat and exactly what praise they bestowed upon him. 

There are times to encourage humility, I suppose, and this was not one of them. 

After much rear-view mirror active listening and profuse gushing of amazement, though, he quieted. He looked out his window while he mulled something over, and then he earnestly revealed his question. 

“Mom? Do you still know how to skip?”

There’s that gentle spirit. Not just boastful and excited, but curious and thoughtful, asking the kind of question that six year olds don’t ask very often, one that seeks mutual connection more than just selfish gain. 

I do, in fact, still know how to skip, and I told him so. There were follow up questions, of course, about when I learned how to skip and when was the last time I skipped and what did I like about it and could we have a skipping race when we got home. I answered all of those questions too, as my enthusiasm began to tire. 

But his question rang in my ears. “Do you still know how to skip?” 

It was the “still” that made it snag. It was his [correct] assumption that certainly I, and maybe all grown ups, were taught to skip as children, but more than that, his uncertainty that it was a skill I had retained; his precious understanding that the skills of childhood, left unused, can be lost. 

I can’t hula hoop anymore. I used to show off my hula hoop skills in any backyard that would have me, maneuvering the hoop up and down my wiry body, onto each arm, even overhead if I was really showing off. I vaguely remember watching grownups at barbecues and beach gatherings stumble upon a hula hoop on the ground and give it a try, usually earning a laugh for their incompetence. I can’t pinpoint when I forgot how to do it or recall the last time I successfully circled my hips just right, but nevertheless, I am that incompetent grown up now.

And it begs the question: What else have I forgotten along the way?

I’m not nearly as good at asking for help as my kids are, that’s for sure. They ask for so much assistance with such simple tasks that I worry they’re downright lazy sometimes, but you can’t fault a guy for asking, I guess. I imagine that I wasn’t much different as a kid, asking my mom to help carry my school stuff inside from the car when her arms were likely already overflowing, or asking for a drink of water when I was perfectly capable of fetching one myself. The pendulum has swung, though, and these days I assume everything I can do, I should do, and asking for help might mean I’m lazy or incapable. I’m not terrible at delegating, and I’m pretty clever at trading favors, but so many times when I am at the end of my rope, grasping for time or patience or skills that just aren’t there, I can’t seem to maneuver the words into the truth I surely admitted a million times in my childhood: I need help with this. 

My imagination has mostly withered away, too. I took a kids’ sewing class for a couple years with some friends from my Campfire troupe when I was about 10 or 11 (sidenote: I can still sew, by the way), and one of the first projects we set out to do on our own was to make costumes for the games of make believe we always played in Julia’s forest-like backyard. We were wizards and fairies and nymphs, connected by various ridiculous family ties and made up myths. I lost interest in make believe by the time I hit junior high, though, and now I can’t even make it through Lord of the Rings without getting a headache from rolling my eyes so hard at the outlandish world of make believe and fictional creatures (I know this is a polarizing admission. Please don’t hate me.). That kind of imagination feels useless to me now, and even if I found myself in need of a lavish fantasy I’m not sure I could drum one up. At age 37 my dream car is a Honda Accord that gets great gas mileage and runs forever with little-to-no maintenance. My Campfire friends would be so disappointed. 

I’m not as gracious with myself as I used to be, either. The work of childhood is fraught with failure, but as children we hardly recognize it as such. Of course we missed the shot or fell off the bike or got the question wrong or lost the toy, we were still learning. If we had wallowed in those imperfect outcomes we would’ve never learned how to do the thing we were attempting, and even though I had no idea what grace meant back then, surely I extended it to myself because I can now successfully make the shot and ride my bike and do long division. I never felt like a failure for needing multiple attempts to learn those skills, I felt like a kid, right on track. But I guess somewhere along the line I subscribed to an idea that grown ups should, in fact, be able to do most things perfectly on the first try. Burning dinner can ruin my whole night, even if it’s the first time I’ve tried the recipe. Missing a deadline at work can make me so anxious and ashamed I want to avoid checking email until I can submit a perfectly finished product. Losing my temper at my kids? I want to call CPS on myself. It appears I have lost touch with the notion of my youth that learning takes lots of tries, and time, and yes, that mysterious thing called grace.

We got home from school and my kids were tumbling out of the car before I could turn the engine off, backpacks and sweatshirts trailing behind them. They dumped their wares on the kitchen floor despite the daily reminder they receive about where those things actually go, and they exploded out the back door to burn off their school day energy on the trampoline. I usually get about 15 minutes of freedom from this after-school energy burst, but that day, before I could even send that one last email to officially wrap up my work day, I hear my son calling for me from the yard. 

I go outside, annoyed.

“Mom!” he shouts for the countless time since I left my laptop less than one minute ago. “Our skipping race!”

I hate myself for being annoyed, and I will myself to not care about that unsent email. How much longer will his spirit be so gentle? How much longer will he want to race me? How much longer will my validation be the ultimate prize? I don’t know the answers to any of those questions—motherhood is cruel and mysterious like that—but I know that right now, on this day, the day he learned how to skip, those questions are all in my favor. So I survey my messy backyard and I remind myself to count these blessings, and with an accepting nod I line up at the edge of the grass. My son hurries over to stand beside me. 

On your marks, get set, go.

Yes, I still know how to skip. I pump my arms and kick my knees up as high as I can. He shrieks in delight and competitiveness as we skip across the grass. The race is only a few seconds in total, but for those few seconds I am transported to the version of myself that skips often, and still knows how to hula hoop. For those few seconds it isn’t at all improbable that, should I need it, I might ask for help freely and unapologetically. I feel the version of myself that delights in playing make believe, and understands that learning anything takes lots of tries. 

I let him win the race, and for a moment I question if it was the right move. He pumps his arms in the air and celebrates his victory like it might as well be the Super Bowl. Theoretically I should be teaching him about sportsmanship and humility and all that, but the joy on his face is worth the transgression. I effortlessly extend him that grace today. 

And after the celebrating subsides, as he turns towards the trampoline and I begin to turn back toward that one last email, I take a deep breath and I extend myself the same grace, for the transgressions of all that I have seemingly let wither away as I’ve found my way into adulthood and motherhood.

Maybe all those skills of childhood are still inside me somewhere, after all. 

Photo by Ashlee Gadd