01/08/99

A Velvet Tether

Children learn early in life that language is power. A few well chosen words can get a brother or sister in instant trouble. Ghastly tales about school or daycare trigger parental guilt just enough to get an extra dessert or later bedtime. "No, Dad, I don’t have homework tonight." How is Dad to know?

And parents don’t know, of course, unless they take the time to call the school every day to check. Their only other choice is to teach their children about trust.

Trust is a rather nebulous concept in the mind of a child. But each time words and behavior don’t match, a perceptive parent can make the concept a bit clearer.

One afternoon my first grader brought a toy food mixer home in her backpack. When I asked her where she got it, she told me that a friend at school had loaned it to her. I later found out she had taken it from school without asking. We spoke about words and trust after she spent five minutes in "time out."

Another time her daycare mother asked me whether I had been packing lunches for school each day, because my daughter arrived each afternoon asking for extra food, claiming that I had forgotten to pack her a lunch. Once or twice was believable, but every day? That night we talked again after a longer "time out." She promised not to do it anymore.

A few days later, she thoughtfully brought me a bouquet of tulips she said she had picked in the field across the street. Knowing that tulips don’t grow wild, I asked her to show me exactly where she got them. She took me into the field and insisted the tulips had come from there. Apparently serious talks and “time-out” were but minor annoyances in the face of this power to create convenient realities with words.

"Perhaps if I can make the concept of trust less abstract," I thought, "my daughter will be able to understand its importance." I wanted her to know that earning someone’s trust is just as satisfying, maybe even more satisfying, than manipulating people with words.

I took a long velvet ribbon and tied one end around my waist and the other around hers. "If I can’t trust you when I can’t see you," I said, "we’ll just have to stay together." It was a fun game at first, but when she got tired of helping me cook dinner, watch the news, and make phone calls, she began to get upset. She wanted her freedom back and she wanted it now! "I know what the ribbon means, Mom," she said quietly, as I gave her my end.

In those few minutes, the velvet ribbon had helped her understand that honesty is something you carry with you always, even when other people are out of sight. Words can build trust or tear it down. To this day, some fifteen years later, my daughter’s word is her bond.

Please send questions or comments to bbruno@snet.net.