She Was Meant for Life

Many young children arrive on our doorsteps ready to attend to us, to what we point out to them, to sing our songs, to play our games, and to follow our lead. In standard preschool classrooms, these are our teacher's pets.But then there are those other kids. These are the ones with their own agendas.Miranda had no interest in toys. Dolls, blocks, and puzzles were in her way. Other children were interesting unless they wanted to "pretend." She had little patience for pretending. She preferred real things. As a two-year-old, she hunted out light switches, then pulled furniture over so she could climb up to reach them, flashing the lights off and on until someone helped her find something else to do.Our vacuum cleaner was aces. She was so fascinated with our pencil sharpener that I wound up purchasing a whole collection of different types of sharpeners for her to explore. She liked tools of all sorts and would make a beeline for the workbench whenever we were outdoors -- she was…