The mystery of a beard.

My littlest son, Tiarnan, five, peered up at me, yesterday morning, his eyes most intent on my chin.

“How did you do that?”, he puzzled, his diminutive fingers stroking the sharp hairs of my new beard.

“It is automatic.”, I said.

“It just happens?”, he clarified.

“Yes.”

There was something about that which made him uncomfortable.

“I just have to stop shaving and it grows.”, I further explained.

“Stop that?”, he asked, miming drawing a blade across his face.

“Yes.”

He absorbed this odd fact carefully.

“Do you want me to make that happen for you?”, I asked him, with not a hint of a smile.

“No.”, he shook his head, with a frown.

“Would you like to wake up tomorrow with a spiky face?”, I pursued.

“NO!”, he became more adamant.

“When you are a big boy, you will have a spiky face.”, I foretold.

He shook his head, again, more firmly, quite sure that this could never happen. “I don’t want it.”, he said, for good measure.

I relented and let him be.

It was funny to see his reaction to my beard. It is only five days old now – but Tiarnan has never seen me with a beard. For him, my transformation has been both unexpected and strange. It was an utter mystery to him how on Earth I managed to turn my smooth face into a spiky one.

It will be interesting to see what he thinks of his nascent beard, when he hits his teens. Will he still be so against it?

Posted by Valentine Cawley

(If you would like to support my continued writing of this blog and my ongoing campaign to raise awareness about giftedness and all issues pertaining to it, please donate, by clicking on the gold button to the left of the page.

To read about my fundraising campaign, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-in-support-of-my.html and here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-first-donation.html

If you would like to read any of our scientific research papers, there are links to some of them, here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/02/research-papers-by-valentine-cawley-and.html

If you would like to see an online summary of my academic achievements to date, please go here: http://www.getcited.org/mbrz/11136175

To learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 7 and Tiarnan, 5, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html

I also write of gifted education, child prodigy, child genius, adult genius, savant, megasavant, HELP University College, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, Malaysia, IQ, intelligence and creativity.

There is a review of my blog, on the respected The Kindle Report here:http://thekindlereport.blogspot.com/2010/09/boy-who-knew-too-much-child-prodigy.html

Please have a read, if you would like a critic's view of this blog. Thanks.

You can get my blog on your Kindle, for easy reading, wherever you are, by going to: http://www.amazon.com/Boy-Who-Knew-Too-Much/dp/B0042P5LEE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=digital-text&qid=1284603792&sr=8-1

Please let all your fellow Kindlers know about my blog availability - and if you know my blog well enough, please be so kind as to write a thoughtful review of what you like about it. Thanks.

My Internet Movie Database listing is at:http://imdb.com/name/nm3438598/

Ainan's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3305973/

Syahidah's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3463926/

Our editing, proofreading and copywriting company, Genghis Can, is athttp://www.genghiscan.com/

This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited. Use only with permission. Thank you.).