The strangeness of London.

I have been away from the city in which I spent much of my youth, rather too long. A couple of days ago, I was giving a talk and I decided by way of introduction, to write up on the board, where I had come from, before arriving in Asia.

I wrote the word: “London.”

It looked very strange on the board, that word. In fact, I had to wonder whether it was a real word at all. It was a very dislocating feeling. The city of my youth seemed to be fictional, in that moment...not real at all, as if it had never existed and I had somehow dreamt it.

I realized, then, that I had been away from Europe too long. My whole European life had acquired the semblance of fiction. The very name of the city of my youth, now seemed not like a real name at all. I thought of “Londoninium”. It might as well have been a Roman city for all the temporal proximity it had to me, in that moment.

I had paused a little long to reflect on the strangeness of the word, “London” and so I turned back to my audience to continue my presentation. Yet, the feeling remained that behind me, on the board, I had written of a town that was not quite real, to me, anymore.

Perhaps, this feeling comes to all who leave the place of their birth and youth and travel far afield. As one travels, and learns of new places, these memories overlay the ones acquired before emigration, until, eventually the original life seems distant, unreachable and, eventually, as has begun to happen in my case, no longer substantial.

There is another aspect to it, of course. “London”, is a very English word. Every day, for the last twelve years, or thereabouts, I have been surrounded by foreign names, in foreign tongues. So, the familiar names of my youth, now seem exotic to me. An inversion has taken place: the places of my youth, once so familiar, now seem to be the strange ones. My experience of many years, has displaced the earlier sense of familiarity and created a new sense of familiarity: now, Malay names and places are the familiar ones to me. English place names have come to seem strange, unreal and not a little fictional.

All this leads me to understand that, perhaps, I should visit London, and Europe, again, before too many more years pass. I need to reacquaint myself with what was once so familiar, before it becomes utterly “foreign” to me, which would be a curious circumstance, indeed.

Then again, perhaps I should write “London” again, a few more times, so that it might come to seem less strange, through the reacquaintance of usage (if such a word exists...my spellchecker thinks not...however I think it should, so I will use it).

This situation could be summarized in a single thought:

I left London, but now London has left me. It is time to find it once more.

Posted by Valentine Cawley

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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!

(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, 4, this month, 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.

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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.

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

Dreams of yesteryear.

Last night, I had the strangest dream. It was the kind of dream that lingered into the waking state.

Indeed, as I lay, between sleep and waking, I thought I heard my parents, downstairs: it was as if I could half-hear them, in distant conversation. Then I awoke, fully, and the sensation faded.

Yet, for a moment, it seemed as if I was back in my parental home, in my former bedroom, listening to the world, from my vantage on the top floor. It was uncanny. It was also most meaningful. It told me, in the way the unconscious is wont to tell us, that, perhaps, it is time to go home. I really should visit my parents, soon. I have been living in far flung places, too long, it seems. So, a visit, at least, is in order.

Many years have passed since I left for Singapore, in 1999. Barring a couple of years’ break, I have lived in South-East Asia, ever since. I have learnt new perspectives on the world and come to understand things I would not otherwise have done. Yet, there has been an “opportunity cost” of doing so. I have foregone all the time I could have spent with my family in Europe. I have missed many opportunities for conversation and sharing. I have lost out on many events that others witnessed, but I did not.

What, perhaps, is not so readily realized by most, is that the life we choose, comes at an infinite cost. To choose one life, is to give up the infinite variety of other lives that we could have lived instead. Thus, all lives come at infinite cost and infinite sacrifice. This morning, before the world awoke, I lay abed and felt an echo of that sacrifice: I felt the world I had left behind, impinge on my present. I felt, once more, what it was like to be home, as it was, when I was younger. It was a comforting visitation from yesteryear. I fell asleep, again, thereafter, to dream dreams of impossible places and worlds that will never be realized. Yet, I had felt a “dream” of a world that was once very real to me. I slept very well.

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To learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 7 and Tiarnan, 4, this month, 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.

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Evoking memories of Ireland.

Today, the most unaccountable thing happened: I stepped out of my house, in Kuala Lumpur, into the depths of the Ireland, of my childhood. It was the most uncanny feeling. It is also one I shall explain.

When I left home, today, the light was subdued, the sky being heavily overcast, so that the customarily so-bright-you-have-to-squint light, had been muted, to a dull, comfortable grey. Not only that, but there was a light drizzle falling, teasing with the unkept threat of rain to come. Opposite my house, there is a verdant field, of a plush green. This simultaneous conjunction of green, drizzle and greyness, suddenly convinced some deeper part of myself, that I was in Ireland. It was so like my childhood memories of the place: the incessant drizzle, the overcast sky, and its dullness of light, surrounded by endless green, that tumbles on, as far as the eye can see. It felt, in that moment, so Irish, so characteristic of my childhood days – now very distant – in that green and moist land. It was the oddest thing I can recall feeling in many years. My body, at its core, was convinced it was in Ireland: all the cues were there, all the signs of that unforgotten land. If only I had not known, for a fact, that I was not there, I could have believed it with all of myself.

I was with Ainan, at the time – and I tried to explain to him what I felt and why I felt it. I tried to make him see what Ireland was like. He listened quietly, having no experience of the place. I realized, though, in trying to explain my sense of Ireland to him, that I needed to go there and show my children what it was like. I cannot let their childhoods pass without giving them some experience of the land that played such a part in my own upbringing.

Ireland was not long in Kuala Lumpur. An hour or two later, when I emerged from my University, the moment had passed: the sky was no longer so grey or dull, the light had brightened to its customary discomfort, the rain had stopped and the green was elsewhere. Yet, the reminder remained within me, echoing on. The message for me, is clear. I cannot forever remain in Asia, but must, some day return to Europe, even if only for awhile. Today, I had not gone to Ireland, but Ireland had come to me. There is meaning in that, it seems to me. Perhaps it is time, I returned and visited, once more – but this time, with a new family in tow. I wonder what they will make of it? I know this, however: should they visit, it will give them a sense memory, such as the one that today evoked for me. It will give them a memory that they, too, might one day recall, many years from today, when their father is old and their children are young. I have to give them that. It will give them a bridge not only to their own past, but to mine, too. Such a bridge is worth building: it is what ties us to whence we came.

Perhaps, when I am old, my children will speak of the time (s) they were in Ireland (and the UK). I will know, then, that they share some part of the world I grew up in. There is a beauty in that, a symmetry which those who reflect on life, can only find rewarding.

If I am still writing, then, I will tell of that day. To do so, will be to have come full circle, in a satisfying way. Until then, then…

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 7 and Tiarnan, 4, this month, 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.)

Like father, like son.

Yesterday, I sat at the computer typing, as I am now doing. Behind me, Tiarnan busied himself with something, that I could only hear, and not see.

"I like THAT one...and that one!", he said to himself.

Wondering just what it was that he liked, I turned around.

There, he had laid out a series of "Conan" books, side by side, in a long line. Each had a picture on the front of the heroic Conan engaged in some swordplay - either with other warriors (though hugely outnumbered, in all cases), or with a monster of some kind - usually, most oddly, a giant snake.

I rose from my desk and walked over to him, curious as to which of these heroic images he liked.

"Which ones do you like?", I asked him.

"All of them!", he said, sweeping his arm down the length of the long line of Conan books.

I thought this a funny moment and it made me wonder many things. Long ago, as a boy, I had read Robert E. Howard's Conan books. They had appealed to my teenage imagination, with their tales of the resolute Conan hacking his heroic way through a brutal ancient world, with barely a scratch, so talented was he in swordplay. There was something primal about the stories, something basic and fundamental, to early man - and therefore, by extension, to us all, for that is where we come from. (Though, of course, the details would be rather different and no man could survive long living as Conan did.)

Now, before me, my three year old son, was interested in the very same books that had held my childhood imagination (or some of them, anyway...I read a lot of books). It seems that the same heroic imagery had a hold over my three year old, as it had had over me as a thirteen year old. What was it about the images that appealed to him? Was it the strength of the hero? Was it the heroism itself? Was it its depiction of a bygone age, that had never actually been? I didn't ask him these questions, though: I just witnessed, warmly, his enthusiastic gaze, on those images that, once, long ago, had held a fascination for me, too.

Our children are much more like us, than we might imagine. Not only do they, of course, look like us...but the choices that they make, the tastes that they show, the things that they like to do and be, are often remarkably similar too. In a way, this is a very good thing - for it means that, as he grows up, I can share his interests supported as they are, by remembrance that I, too, had once been interested in the same things. We are, therefore, bonded together, by these shared sympathies, and likings.

You may be wondering why I have a series of Conan books in my house. Well, they are there for nostalgia. They are not the original ones that once I read - for those are back in England. They are another set that I came across - and found myself purchasing out of a desire to have something of my youth. They reminded me of the boy I had once been.

Now, of course, I don't think I could bring myself to read them. I don't think I would connect to them in the way I once did. They seem too distant from me now. Also, I have so many other things to do, that I don't find the time for the simple pleasures of reading fiction. Thus, I tend not to read fiction, anymore. If I do read, it is usually factual material.

Yet, it is good to have them around the house. It makes me feel that somewhere, the boy I used to be, is still around somewhere too. Only, now he is three - and likes two covers in particular!

(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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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.)

Tiarnan reminisces about his baby times

Tiarnan is now thirteen months old. This event happened when he was twelve months old.

He had been walking for several months, including up and down stairs and was quite comfortable on his feet. This day, however, he looked at the floor and got down on his knees and started crawling - something he had not done for months. As he did so, there was a big smile on his face and a slight look of amusement that he should ever have had to move in that way.

Clearly, Tiarnan was reminiscing about his crawling days - and doing so from a vantage of amusement that he should ever have been a crawler.

This is not the only evidence I have seen in Tiarnan of nostalgia, of some kind: I think he is a baby who reflects on himself and his growth and sees his own personal change. He is watching himself grow up. It is interesting that he is self-aware in this way and tracks his own change. I find that rather mature - and not at all like a baby is expected to be. Interesting.

Tiarnan and musical nostalgia

It is said that young babies have little memory, but I have many reasons to doubt that. I won't give them all, here, but will just let one story speak on its own.

Tiarnan is thirteen months old, now. Several months ago, he was given a musical penguin, to play with. Everytime a button was pressed it would play a tune. Tiarnan got the chance to play with that toy for perhaps a day, before his older brother, Ainan had an idea for it. Ainan, rather wittily, wanted to know whether the penguin would do well underwater. In particular, he wanted to know if you could hear it underwater. Thus, Ainan took it down to the swimming pool and threw it in the water. Let us just say, this was one penguin that couldn't swim.

That was the last time I saw the penguin in action.

Yesterday, Syahidah, Tiarnan's mother, partly hummed, partly sung a tune. She managed more to capture the rhythm of it than the notes.

At once, Tiarnan looked up and looked around, seeking something. "Toy!", he said.

Tiarnan remembered the penguin toy he had had for a day, before it drowned, some months ago. For the tune on Syahidah's lips was the one it used to play.

Tiarnan got all excited to hear the tune and looked at his mother and said: "Again!"

So, she hummed/sang it again.

It seems that Tiarnan remembers a tune long after it was heard - even though it was heard only briefly. He remembers too where and from which object the tune came. He also possesses a sense of excitement to be so reminded - though it is difficult to identify the source of that. Is it the recognition that excites him? Is it the music? Or did he like the toy and hope that it would be seen "alive" again?

Perhaps I should go quietly to the shop from which it was bought, and buy a dry replacement.

It might be a popular move.

(If you would like to read more of Tiarnan, thirteen months, or his gifted brothers Fintan, three, and Ainan, seven years and three months, a scientific child prodigy, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html I also write of gifted education, IQ, intelligence, child prodigy, child genius, baby genius, adult genius, savant, the creatively gifted, gifted adults and gifted children in general. Thanks.)