James Brody
November 22nd, 2006, 12:34 PM
Colt, G H (1998) Were you born that way? Life, April, pp. 38-50.
p. 50: "A few nights ago, watching my daughter arrange her 37 Beanie Babies by color and species, I felt a shock of recognition?and glanced over at my wife, who wears the same expression when she arranges Shakespeare's plays in chronological order. My lump of putty is eight now, and I don't need a DNA scan to tell me she has inherited her mother's intelligence, her father's stubbornness, her grandfather's wit. The genes may be familiar, but the mix?thank heavens?is unique. Warts and all, she is exactly the child I want.
"When I look at her, I see a part of me. When I look at myself, it seems there's less of me than there once was. At a recent party, schmoozing with one last guest on my way out the door, I suddenly thought, I'm acting exactly like my father! Having spent my youth fighting to forge my own identity, I find, increasingly, that I resemble the very parent against whom I worked so hard to rebel: his social ease, his sense of humor?and, now that I am in my forties, his thinning hair and slight potbelly. Indeed, as I get older, I feel that instead of adding layers, I am shedding skins. In becoming more like my parents, I am becoming more myself. I am surprised but delighted that it all feels so comfortable?not an imprisoning but a coming home."
p. 50: "A few nights ago, watching my daughter arrange her 37 Beanie Babies by color and species, I felt a shock of recognition?and glanced over at my wife, who wears the same expression when she arranges Shakespeare's plays in chronological order. My lump of putty is eight now, and I don't need a DNA scan to tell me she has inherited her mother's intelligence, her father's stubbornness, her grandfather's wit. The genes may be familiar, but the mix?thank heavens?is unique. Warts and all, she is exactly the child I want.
"When I look at her, I see a part of me. When I look at myself, it seems there's less of me than there once was. At a recent party, schmoozing with one last guest on my way out the door, I suddenly thought, I'm acting exactly like my father! Having spent my youth fighting to forge my own identity, I find, increasingly, that I resemble the very parent against whom I worked so hard to rebel: his social ease, his sense of humor?and, now that I am in my forties, his thinning hair and slight potbelly. Indeed, as I get older, I feel that instead of adding layers, I am shedding skins. In becoming more like my parents, I am becoming more myself. I am surprised but delighted that it all feels so comfortable?not an imprisoning but a coming home."