On the naming of children and adults.

A couple of days ago, Tiarnan, 7, approached me with a concerned look in his troubled eyes.

“Do people’s names change when they get older?” He asked, rather intently.

“Why?”, I invited, softly.

“Because Tiarnan sounds like a little boy’s name.”, said my little boy, with a not so little frown.

“Tiarnan means Lord.” I said by way of countering him.

He imbibed the word, Lord, and considered it whether it was worthy. He didn’t seem convinced. Clearly, the sound of the name, overwhelmed whatever meaning it might have for him.

I found this exchange rather enlightening for what it says about Tiarnan’s inner thoughts. It is evident that he is looking ahead, to a time when he would be an adult. He is considering what it might be like to have his present name, in that time...and finds it wanting. It also means he is forming external perspectives on his own name, coming to an understanding of how other (adults) might perceive it. This is quite mature reflection for such a little boy.

Then again, I wonder who or what has led him to be unsatisfied with his name. It is a fine name in my view and has a worthy meaning. I will have to ask him about it.

All our children have well chosen names, with interesting meanings. Each name is, in effect, a little story. I won’t delve here, into the full meaning of their names, for that is a personal matter – but I do believe that names should be chosen with the greatest care.

I hope, one day, Tiarnan might like his name, as much as we do.

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/11136175To 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.) 

The birds and the bees.

It is ever illuminating to see the world through a child’s eyes. Once grown up, this is quite a challenge, however, as a parent, all I have to do is listen, to know again, the thoughts of a child and their perspectives on the world.

Today, Fintan, eight, approached his mother in a reflective mood. His voice was soft and insightful.

“Mummy,” he began, intently, “I think it is harder to be a girl...”

Her ears perked up and her eyes gazed down on her middle son.

“...because girls have to give birth.”

She was touched by his words, for she learnt, in that moment, that her son understood what every mother goes through, to create their children. To have such appreciation, from her young son, was warming indeed.

I like seeing my children come to their own understanding of the world. More interestingly, I like to see them come to their own views on it – to see them weigh issues and come to judgements. Usually, I let them come to their own views, and do not impose mine. It is much better for a child to think their own thoughts and form their own view on the world. It is also much more interesting. Children who have been indoctrinated too much – as some children are – are always so dull. It is much more refreshing to hear a child’s genuine thoughts, based on their own personal thinking – and that is what I hear, everyday, in my household. I wouldn’t want it any other way. Today, Fintan made my wife very happy – simply because he shared one of his own thoughts. Beautiful.

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.)

A memory of childhood.

A few weeks ago, my wife, Syahidah, was reminiscing.

“One day, when I was nine years old, I came to understand something: as an adult, you have a choice. I wanted to remember this, when I grew up, so I said to myself: remember this – as an adult you have a choice.”

Her gaze was curiously inward and a little fond, as if touched by the little girl she had been.

“Well, you did remember.”

“Yes.”, she said quietly, pleased.

I was touched by this account. It was a sweet notion, that the little girl she had been, should try to communicate with the adult she was to become, by deliberately seeking to remember an insight she had had, into adulthood. It struck me as quite a mature thing to do for the little girl she had been. It meant that she understood the unfolding of life and what she would one day become. It also meant that she felt a need to speak to her older self, when she was no longer around to be able to do so. It meant she sought a sense of continuity between the present, that would one day be past, and the future that had not yet become.

Syahidah grew a little rueful beside me, as she dwelt on her younger self’s thought.

“Of course, when you become an adult, you realize that it is sometimes a little more complicated than that.”, she observed, cryptically.

“Yes. Sometimes. There are obligations.”

We agreed, in silence – but also, I think, in appreciation of the child she had been and the wisdom she had shown to understand that quintessential difference between a child’s life and an adult’s life – but also to have wished to communicate it, to her older self.

I had never met the child she had been – but I felt then, that she had been an impressive one, in a way, for she was, even when so young, seeking to understand what life was and how it is lived, at different ages. My wife would have been an interesting child to speak to, I think. Then, again, no doubt that is why she became an interesting adult to speak to!

It is funny to consider it but I feel this tale of my wife’s brought her younger self into the room with us, as if she did, in fact, manage to speak to the future: I felt her presence, on my wife’s tongue, in my wife’s eyes and in the expression on her face. My wife’s nine year old self had succeeded in bridging time, to speak with us, across all those years. She had, in fact, spoken to the husband she could never have guessed she would one day meet. How strange -and how touching. There was a depth to that moment, that reached back across the decades to a little girl, who no longer was, and a thought that had endured.

Thank you, Syahidah, for sharing that moment. It brought your childhood alive, for me. I glimpsed who you had been and sensed the wisdom you had, even then. Thanks.

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.)

Relativity and fasting.

Recently, my young sons have had the experience of fasting. They have endured it pretty well – Fintan, 8, and Ainan, 11, anyway, Tiarnan, 5, is too young to fast.

Fintan had an interesting take on the effects of fasting:

“When I fast, the day seems to last much longer.”

This remark had an added poignancy considering that he was in the middle of a fasting day at the time he made it!

He then went on to describe his perceptions of each fasting day. They did, indeed, seem to stretch out ahead of him. Fintan certainly did experience a "time dilation of fasting". It was funny since, for him, this was a first experience with the perceptual alteration of time – though for any adult, this will be an old experience and one well known.

It did seem, however, that the effect of fasting on his time sense was particularly pronounced and that it really DID make the days seem longer. I have no comparable experience of fasting, at his age, to come to my own assessment, however. As an adult, I find that fasting has no real effect on my time perception at all – perhaps because I am very used to fasting and it doesn’t bother me at all.

I should note that Fintan wasn’t bemoaning this elongation of his time perception...he was just observing that it was so. As a faster, he is very good. He doesn’t complain and just endures. This is characteristic of him when faced with any personal challenge – he just gets on with it, largely in silence. I think, in this way, fasting is a good challenge for young children – it strikes at the very heart of their natural instinct to eat and eat, non-stop all the junk they can possibly get their hands on. With fasting, they have to come to understand the value of food. In the case of Fintan, that seems very much tied up in time. Perhaps food is his clock and he has been measuring the days out by their meals. Stretch the meals and you are stretching Fintan’s day!

Well done, Fintan, on being able to fast so well. I am proud of your strength of will.

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.).

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.).

A world without Winter.

A few days ago, as I readied my sons for bedtime, Fintan, eight, sat up in his bed and fixed his wondering gaze upon me.

“Daddy: have you seen Winter?” He said this season as if it were something magical and strange.

“Yes, Fintan, I have seen Winter.”

His wonder seemed to expand as he gazed on his Daddy, who had seen such a magical thing.

“Has Mummy seen Winter?”, he enquired, further, perhaps doubting whether both of us could have done such a wondrous thing.

“Yes. Mummy has seen Winter.”

“That’s not fair!”, he said, with a small bedtime sized explosion. “I haven’t seen Winter.”

“You will one day, Fintan.”, I assured. He didn’t seem to hear me.

“I want to see a snowflake.”, he revealed, seeming to imagine the snowflake in the half darkness before him, falling from the sky to the bed, before him.

“You will one day, Fintan. I will take you to a country where they have snow.”

He grew quiet at that, his imagination seeming to drift off to snowy lands within his unseen future.

He fell asleep and I left the room, quietly.

None of my children have seen snow. They have lived out their lives near the Equator, where the sun ever shines and the summer never ends. To some, this might seem like a special privilege, to always have the summer to hand – but to Fintan, it seemed like a deprivation, because he had never seen the Winter that he had heard so much about. He wanted a world of seasons, of change, not one of eternal summer stasis.

One day, Fintan, you will see the Winter. I hope it meets your expectations. You might, for instance, be surprised at what a cold day feels like. I look forward to your reaction, on that day.

Sleep well, Fintan. Dream of snowy landscapes, that you will one day, tread on.

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.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.)

The perspective of young boys, on girls.

A couple of days ago, Tiarnan, five, was sitting on the sofa, with Fintan, seven. They were taking a conversational break, in the midst of their computer gaming. For reasons unknown to me, perhaps because I had not heard the fullness of their conversation, Tiarnan turned to Fintan, and said, quite emphatically:

“I don’t like girls: they do BORING things.” He said the word “boring” as if it were the most boring thing in the Universe: the word expanded to fill all space and time, on his tongue.

Fintan didn’t do, as might be expected and second this opinion. In quite a reasonable tone he said: “Tiarnan, some girls have PS3s…”

Tiarnan consider that for a moment, but had no reply. It seemed that anyone who liked the PS3 couldn’t be all bad.

In answer, he picked up his PS3 controller and went back to his game. I don’t think he wanted to admit that if a girl was a PS3 player then maybe she wouldn’t be so “boring” after all!

This exchange struck me as funny. It echoes the age old theme, that young boys are not fond of girls – because they are, well, “girlish”…however, that will soon change when they hit puberty. How funny it is that children are constructed in this way.

(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 at http://www.genghiscan.com/

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

Nostalgia for early childhood.

Tiarnan is but five years old. Despite this, he actually feels nostalgic, at times, or least fond of, his early childhood.

Yesterday, Tiarnan was reminiscing with his mum, Syahidah.

“You know, when I was three years old, I watched Primeval...”, his eyes were alight with memories of those first impressions of the TV series. “I was SO small.”, said our little boy.

His mind turned to other memories then. “I remember, when I was a little boy, I got stuck in the lift.”

Syahidah looked down on him, remembering the incident, too. Tiarnan had got stuck in the lift, on his own.

“Do you know WHY I got stuck?”, he asked his mummy, feeling a certain exasperation at the way things were.

She didn’t answer, but waited for him to speak further.

“I got stuck because I was too small to reach the buttons.”

He seemed to be in the lift, again, in his mind, unable to reach up far enough, unable to escape.

Tiarnan felt again the distress of his younger self.

Tiarnan quite often revisits his past. He frequently refers to distant past events, displaying both a clarity of memory and an inability to forget that which touched him.

What is interesting, for me, about this, is the way Tiarnan conceives of himself. He looks back to his younger self, and thinks of that younger version as “so small”...seeing his earlier self as a little boy, someone distant and distinct from his present “mature” state. He sees himself as big, as developed, as more sophisticated than he used to be only two or three years ago. He also thinks of that earlier time as “SO long ago”. To us, of course, it doesn’t seem long ago, at all. To us he has grown up, in an instant.

When he speaks of his earlier self, he seems fond of what he sees there, but also apart from it. He sees himself as Other, as More, than he used to be. It is curious to see how he monitors his own growth and change, over time. He is very much self-aware, not only of his self now, but the self he used to have.

I wonder, now, if he will remember his early childhood, when he becomes an adult. Will he recall his own inward, backward gaze to earlier times? Will he remember his own fondness for his littler self within? I hope so. I would like to talk to him, one day, about how he used to reminisce, on his earlier days. In a way, he is like a little old man, looking back on his life – yet his life has just begun. He considers his past, in the way the elderly do: considering again, important times, highlights, moments of greatness and moments of revelation. Come to think of it, we seem to specialize in little old men. Our house if full of them. It would be funny to see what they will be like when they are actually old men. Sadly, I am unlikely to be around, then, to make the comparison for them. My words, here, shall have to serve in my place. Perhaps they will then be able to make the comparison on their own.

Happy reminiscing, Tiarnan!

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The way children understand.

Children are wonderfully open to experience. They allow themselves to do and see things few adults would do. 

The other day, Tiarnan started to explain a children's programme he had been watching on a DVD to his mother. With great animation and excitement he detailed for her, the plot of this film. He even accompanied his explanation with special effects sounds and gestures to illustrate the pictures he was painting. She listened intently.

What was funny about all of this, however, is that the DVD was in a language Tiarnan does not know: Thai. He had watched a Thai film and understood the plot of the film, enough to explain it to his mother, without having any access to the language at all. Few adults would, I feel, sit through an unsubtitled foreign language film, in an unfamiliar tongue. Fewer still would actually understand much of it or find it watchable, in any way. Tiarnan, however, was more than happy to watch it and more than able to focus on its strangeness and extract meaning from the, to him, "wordless" images. 

I am struck by this, how open Tiarnan is. When I compare him to adults I see closure in them, and openness in him. I would like to see him retain this openness, as he grows up, though I know it is customary for people to close down as they get older. In some ways, every adult should be like a child. I feel we would all be deeper, more learned, flexible people if that were so. Sadly, most adults are like adults - with all the limitations that implies. I wonder how this special quality of openness is lost along the way? Is it really necessary that we should all close down? 

Not only did Tiarnan watch the Thai film - but he later requested it repeatedly. He enjoyed it to the point of deliberately seeking it out. That indication of openness impressed me. 

Sadly, I don't think I could sit through a Thai film several times, without understanding it. Oh dear...I must have "grown up". 

Thank you, Tiarnan, for showing me a better way to be. 

(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.

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