There was a children’s clothing store in our neighborhood. My mother sometimes went to have a long chat with the saleswoman. When I say long, I mean long. Of course, we were young and didn’t know how to tell time, and when kids get bored, hours seem like centuries, especially when they’re standing still. We certainly weren’t running around between the racks or touching the clothes. The saleswoman always complimented my mother: “They’re so well behaved! So calm, so patient.”
When I think back on it now, it upsets me, because as I learned much later, it isn’t natural for a bored child to be good as gold indefinitely. The saleswoman might as well have said, “They’re so subdued. Lifeless, even. You really managed to break them.”
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