Drama At The Spelling Bee

I meant to write about this a couple of weeks ago when it happened, and promptly forgot. Typical.

So I thought I'd write about it now.

A couple of weeks ago, KayKay had her first Spelling Bee.

It was a big deal.

She practiced for HOURS each day for TWO WEEKS before the bee. All of her first-grade words, she mostly knew. But then she went on to practice and memorize ALL of the second-grade words, which the first-graders were to be quizzed on if they finished all the first-grade words. Over four-hundred words.

Four hundred.

Hours, I tell you.

And she talked about it every day. And wrote each word, all four-hundred-and-change of them, like two or three times each. I was sick of spelling words after the first week. I had to quiz her constantly on them. Even on the weekends.

Have I mentioned that she wanted to win?

And I wanted her to win, too. I mean, all those hours of work. Seriously.

She invited everyone she saw to come see her in the bee. They took the top five spellers from each first grade class, and of course, she was one of the top five. According to her teacher, she was "the top" of the five. I would have been shocked had it been otherwise.

The day of the bee came, and we ambled over to the school cafeteria as a family. The Daddy even took the morning off in order to watch her.

She did beautifully. Stumbled a bit on one word, but no big. It started as twenty first-graders, then ten, then five, and then... She was in the top three! Whoooo!

I was so proud. She was doing fantastic. I just knew she was going to win.

And then, out of the blue, the judges sprung a third-or-fourth-grade word. WHAT?!?!

KayKay got the first of a number of these higher-level words. Vessel.

She's six. She doesn't even know what a vessel is, for Pete's sake. Whoever Pete is.

She tried so hard. She fumbled and stumbled, and failed miserably.

My poor KayKay. She ran off the stage in tears. It was quite the dramatic exit. She ran straight into the Daddy's arms, where he comforted her with whispered consolation. I have never been more grateful for his strong arms. I think I would have ended up crying with her, if it'd been up to me.

I felt awful for her. And a little indignant. It's petty, I know, to be indignant over a first-grade spelling bee. But the whole thing felt rather unfair - the other two kids got a bunch of hard words, but they let them stay up there even after misspelling four or five in a row, simply because the words were too hard for these little kids to spell. Not that the boy who did win didn't deserve it, either... Because I'm sure he did. And he was very proud.

Even now, it hurts my heart to envision her crushed hopes in that moment. My girl could have won. I dare say, she should have won.

But it was a good lesson learned for both of us. I had promised her the "hugest ice-cream she could eat" if she won. Instead, we went to her favorite book store, and picked out a new book for her to read. She picked The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, which I have not read, but all of us girls *love* the movie. I'm excited to read it after she finishes.

The Daddy assured her that even though she didn't win, she was the best speller of her class. And that was good enough for her. I wasn't as easily satisfied and fretted to myself about it a bit, but he's right. It's good enough for me, now, too.

I don't want to cultivate the need to be "perfect" in my daughter the way I needed to be "perfect" myself as a child. I was a pleaser and out of that was born a strong need to be perfect. Fortunately the years have mellowed much of that in me since childhood, but I don't want see that in her. Especially not through expectation on my part. I must be so careful and work so hard not to put undue pressure on her regarding performance. God granted, I will be able to avoid those pitfalls and just enjoy the sweetness of who she is and not what she does.

She is just so good at so many things that sometimes it's hard to not expect her to be the best at everything. However, I think she, and more especially me, needed to see that she's not always going to win, because not everything is fair and follows perfectly by the rules or runs exactly the way it's supposed to, and that it's just okay.

It's just so hard as a mother to see your little one disappointed. It's one thing to be the one saying no, or not giving them something that they want. It's quite another to watch them work so hard for something and miss it by an inch or a foot or a left-out letter "e".

Interestingly, a few days later, I was cleaning out her backpack, and came across a paper with the word Vessel printed on it, along with a pronunciation guide and dictionary meaning.

Apparently, she'd had her teacher look it up for her so she could know the proper spelling and meaning of the word. I think it's time for us to learn about becoming vessels of kindness, joy, holiness, and peace. It is a word which we should use often, methinks. As a reminder that the work is what is important, not necessarily the prize at the end.

If that makes sense.