Indigo Girl

     I took Zadie to the gypsy market, but not, as you might expect, to sell her to gypsies. They were selling little knitted things and handmade jewelry and whatnot, and there were occasional performances of dancing and hula hooping. We passed a small table with a crystal ball and a woman seated behind it. Zadie peered at the ball, asked a few questions, and then settled down to watch the dancing.
    "You know she's special, don't you?"
    "Yes, thank you. She's very special to me."
    "She's an indigo child*. Have you heard of those?"
    "I have."
    Another woman nearby nodded knowingly, and a man leaned in and offered, "She's what we're all trying to become."
    "Well, she's certianly unique. And often very difficult."
    "They always are."

"You're Zadie's mom?"
This time we are at the park.
"Yes."
"I wonder... She reminds me a lot of my older son. Have you read, by any chance, The Mislabeled Child? It's about how some kids who are gifted get labeled hyperactive."
"No, I haven't. It sounds interesting. She certainly does have a lot of energy."
"And she says the most amazing things. She's definitely gifted."
"Well, she's different. We've certainly wondered at times, whether she was hyperactive or had something like sensory processing disorder."
"Oh yes! Does she love movement? My son does, too."

The truth is, we get stopped pretty frequently by people who want to tell me how Zadie is an old soul, gifted, indigo, special in some way. And some of my deepest concerns revolve around the fact that she is different from the other kids in noticable ways. She is active. She has a hard time sitting still. She is passionate, intense, emotional, sometimes mean. She is extremely physical, wiggly, fidgety. When she was still a toddler, I found this article and thought it apt.

My ego as a parent of course wants her to be special. Special in a good way. And I don't want her to be different in the bad way. There is a huge part of me that would love to embrace the gifted label and reject the hyperactive label. The book sounds PERFECT. But I don't want to label my kid at all. I want her to just be who she is. Active, imaginative, verbal, funny, physical, curious, and a thousand things more.

She's very special... to me. That's plenty for now.


*I actually find the tone of this Wikipedia article about indigo children pretty hysterical: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indigo_children