Random Thoughts: In Which I Am Pleasantly Surprised

I have resigned myself to the fact that Molly will never be a performer. This came about from the following incidents:

Incident #1 At 18 months old Molly was walking down the street, my mom and I were walking behind her. She did a little skip or jump and we laughed. She turned around, glared at us, and refused to do it again because we were watching her.

Incident #2 In our church on Mother's Day all the kids go up to sing a little song. Molly refuses to go up and the one time we got her to go she glared at the congregation and nearly burst into tears.

Incident #3 The Friday before Thanksgiving her preschool class of 10 had a little song to sing for the moms. They were lined up in the classroom wearing painted vests and hats. Molly was standing in the line, until she saw the moms come in. She then ripped off her vest and hat, threw them on the floor and ran away.

Incidents #4-#24 Who knows the real number, but there have been plenty.

So fine, I don't really care about her being in the drama club in high school. It's really not a big deal to me. So when the children's program at our church announced they were having a performance I didn't even tell Molly about it. Imagine my surprise when she came to me and said she wanted to sing with the choir.

Next came a week of asking her "Are you sure you want to do this? You know people will look at you, right?" She assured me she wanted to do it.

"I'm going to be brave," she said.

Last night we went to the performance. Bryan and I took bets on exactly what Molly would do on the stage. Would she stand there and look mad? Would she run off the stage screaming? Both were distinct possibilities. But this little girl shocked us both by calmly walking out on the stage, smiling, and singing both songs. It was amazing. And it's not that I now have visions of her performing piano concertos to a full house. It's really about her ability to conquer a huge fear that has been with her for such a long time, which does more than make me proud, it inspires me.