The deepest wish for the future.

To have children, is to be a watcher of the future. To look on them, is to wonder what they might become, one day and to feel a duty to guide them or empower them , to be whatever they truly wish.

A couple of days ago, my wife Syahidah looked at me across the dining table.

“I hope our kids grow to be as patient as you.”, she began, her eyes looking deeply across the table and into the future, at the same time.

I was pleased to hear that implicit compliment.

“...and as tidy as me.”, she said, with a meaningful gaze.

I wasn’t so pleased to hear that implicit criticism!

I laughed though. “That is just like something Fintan might say.”

She smiled her agreement.

We see each other, in each other, every day, in ways little and large. Her remark had the comic structure of Fintan’s utterances – and no doubt, his had that structure, because of her. I felt the invisible bonds of like mindedness joining us, in that moment. We are each a part of the other, a partial reflection of each other. This is a fact of all families – but one too often not fully understood I feel. Every one of our children is a part of us, us a part of them. In their minds are thoughts we would recognize as like our own, feelings too, that we know so well.

I like this togetherness. It is what makes a family feel so different from any other random group of people known to each other. We are not just known to each other – we are like each other, fashioned from the very same cognitive and affective substance.

It is interesting to look at our children and see which elements of them come from my wife and which from myself. It is not difficult to see the jigsaw puzzle that they are, as a rearrangement of components within ourselves.

Considering her wish, I would say I have to agree. I hope they have my patience and her tidiness – the other way around just would not do at all!

One day, we will know. I look forward to that day and all the others, in which my children are becoming. It is a story of infinite richness, written before my eyes, daily. It is also a story I cannot, now, imagine, ever having missed.

Here’s to a patient and tidy future!

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.)

Syahidah communicates with children.

Syahidah, my wife, has an interesting way with children. Somehow, she just knows what to say, to connect with them, in their world. In short, she “speaks their language”.

Yesterday, Tiarnan, five, hadn’t quite finished up his dinner. Perhaps he was full – or perhaps he was distracted. (He is the type to find his imagination more interesting, than what is happening in his immediate surroundings, at times).

Syahidah looked down at her smallest son and said, seriously:

“Eat up your carrots.”

Tiarnan listened, but only because it was his mummy speaking.

“Carrots are good for your eyes.”, she continued, “That is why you don’t see rabbits wearing spectacles.”

I laughed explosively on hearing this. Tiarnan didn't. He maintained a serious demeanour. It was clear that he considered this a fair point, having two rabbits in the house and neither sporting a pair of spectacles.

He ate his carrots.

I thought this a wonderful example of how Syahidah always knows just what to say, to a child, to get them to understand her point. In a way, this is a gift, a communicative gift – and one that is not that common, unfortunately, among adults, or even parents. With most people, we grow too far from our own childhoods, to readily connect to those in theirs. Not so with Syahidah: for her, childhood is very close to the surface and readily reachable. She remembers it well and so can relate to children in a way few can. I think my sons are lucky to have her as their mummy – and I am lucky to have her as my wife!

(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.htmland 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.)

A child friendly country.

Malaysia is a child friendly country - or at least, it makes an effort to be so. Indeed, it makes efforts I have not noticed in neighbouring Singapore.

A week ago, I was in IKEA, the iconic furniture store. What most impressed me about the store was not the size (absolutely immense...it had storage facilities that could swallow Singapore's flagship IKEA store, whole.) No. What impressed me was one little detail that others may overlook. Next to the full sized shopping trolleys, in this store, there was a little row of "toy sized" ones. More precisely, they were miniature shopping trolleys, clearly designed so that three, four and five year olds could push a little trolley around the store, like mummy. How sweet!

There are other details, too, I have noticed. Today, for instance, at Bandar Utama, the shopping centre, I noted something I have not seen in any other country. In the men's toilet, one of the cubicles was larger than the others. In it there were two toilet bowls: a full sized one for Daddy - and a smaller one, beside it, for his son: how thoughtful.

Everywhere there seem to be special areas set aside for children: play areas in which the children can be placed, whilst the adults shop. This is not unique to Malaysia, of course - but it is very common here. The play areas are also rather elaborate. The one in Bandar Utama today, was four stories high, an indoor play area of intricate passages, things to climb up, roll down and generally have fun within.

The other thing, however, is perhaps more important than all of this. It is something that may not be noted, but which is more telling than anything else. It is called a smile. So often, I see the serving staff in shops and restaurants, the people about the city, passing by and, indeed, many of the people we encounter at random, SMILING down at our children. They do not seem irked by their endless energy, by their rapid, random motion, by their jubilant cries as they play out their childhood games...no, they are engaged by them, amused by them and SMILE.

In some countries, my three boys at play would attract scowls, not smiles.

So, I must say I am pleased at the attitudes towards children I have seen, so far, here in Malaysia. I am pleased at the efforts companies put in to make children welcome. I am pleased with the designers of shopping centres, who ensure that there is always plenty for children to do.

What remains to discover, of course, is how the schools are towards children: on that issue, I am presently blind. We will see. In the meantime, I shall continue to enjoy a refreshing welcome for children that I see, here, all around me.

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, a scientific child prodigy, aged eight years and seven months, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, five years exactly, and Tiarnan, twenty-eight months, please go to:http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html I also write of gifted education, IQ, intelligence, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, College, University, Chemistry, Science, genetics, left-handedness, precocity, child prodigy, child genius, baby genius, adult genius, savant, wunderkind, wonderkind, genio, гений ребенок prodigy, genie, μεγαλοφυία θαύμα παιδιών, bambino, kind.

We are the founders of Genghis Can, a copywriting, editing and proofreading agency, that handles all kinds of work, including technical and scientific material. If you need such services, or know someone who does, please go to: http://www.genghiscan.com/ Thanks.

IMDB is the Internet Movie Database for film and tv professionals. If you would like to look at my IMDb listing for which another fifteen credits are to be uploaded, (which will probably take several months before they are accepted) please go to: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm3438598/ As I write, the listing is new and brief - however, by the time you read this it might have a dozen or a score of credits...so please do take a look. My son, Ainan Celeste Cawley, also has an IMDb listing. His is found at: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm3305973/ My wife, Syahidah Osman Cawley, has a listing as well. Hers is found at: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm3463926/

This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication prohibited. Use Only with Permission. Thank you.)