Parenting woes

Seeing Yo Yo Ma the other night at Bass Hall has got me thinking about Gabriel and his love of music, and whether or not we should start taking him to lessons or just keep letting him do his own thing. Ma started playing the cello when he was four (after playing the violin for a year), and it was then that his parents discovered they had a child prodigy on their hands. Now, I'm not saying Gabriel is a prodigy, but he definitely has an ear for music. He can drum out the beat to songs and can pick out different instruments playing. Music is the thing that makes his face light up, it's the thing he turns to when we are frustrating him, or when his brother is screaming and he needs comforting.

I fear the "missed opportunity", where we blindly go on like we are now when taking another step might turn him into a real musician one day. But if we push, he could lose interest altogether, which would be a tragedy also. What to do, what to do? We ask him if he wants to take lessons, and he says yes, but he is still of the age where he says yes to everything we ask him. The music class he took last summer was more of a kinetic movement/learning type of class instead of really learning music and rhythm. And Gabriel didn't want to follow directions, and just sort of did what he wanted. Since Jav and I are both followers, not leaders, we were kind of proud of him for doing his own thing.

The only interest I ever had growing up was to be like everybody else and be popular. I took piano lessons but never practiced so was just so-so after nine years. I took dance but didn't really have my heart in it. I was afraid to do any kind of sports because I was sure I would let my team down. Nothing I did stirred any passions in me, as far as I can remember. Looking back, I think I would have been really good and track and field, but even if I had thought of it back then, I probably wouldn't have had the nerve to try. Young kids that realize what they want to do one day and start working for that goal just baffle me. But if my boys find their paths early I will be behind them, just like I will be if they don't seem to have any direction at all. I just want both boys to be happy, to be themselves and to not worry what other people think. But how do you translate that desire to them, how do you really make them understand? At least they are young and I have a little time to figure that out.