The Importance of Being Earnest
Our 12-year-old Pippa is well into full-on adolescence now, and we’re always a little off balance with her, adjusting on the fly. As she forms her new identity and ventures out into the world with it, there’s much to wonder at and admire, but there are also moments of sadness. For me, one of the hardest has been watching her put on her emotional armor everyday.
Gone are the days when Pippa was an open book. She used to prattle on about whatever came into her head: ideas, emotions, fantasies, dreams. She used to share her inner world with us with full faith that we would protect it and care for it. I don’t think we realized what a gift that was until she took it back.
Nowadays, her inner world is hidden behind a protective layer of snark and steel. She hoards it jealously, as if it’s under attack, and we’re the marauders ready to snatch it away. When we ask what she’s thinking she grunts. When we ask what she’s feeling, she scowls. When we ask her to join us, she refuses. When we ask her to do something she complains.
One way that she polishes her armor is to cover it with cynicism and buff it until it shines. She’s cultivated an air of jaded world-weariness that, on a 12-year-old, is both comical and tiresome. Long gone is the excited little girl who used to delight in every new experience. Instead, we get a steady stream of blasé detachment and boredom.
“Yeah, I’ve seen that.”
“No, I’m good.”
“Why do you think that’s so cool?”
“I can’t believe you didn’t know that.”
“And I should care--why?”
I’ve been trying to understand why this bothers me so much, aside from the fact that it’s just kind of tedious. I think it’s because, right before my eyes, she’s losing something that I’m currently fighting tooth and nail to reclaim: my sense of wonder.
We live in a world where it feels risky to be earnest. Earnestness is a sign of naivete and self-delusion. The world is in crisis, after all, so the only appropriate stance is a cool, sardonic remove. Serious, hip adults watch Breaking Bad and Succession, not Mr. Rodgers and Bob Ross.
The thing is, now that I’m too old to be cool or hip, I’ve gotten tired of lugging around that armor all the time. I’m not even sure what I thought it was protecting me from. From believing that things could be better? From enjoying something that could be taken away? From believing in trite, unoriginal truths? From admitting that something is important to me, even if someone else doesn’t care?
These days, I’m trying to regain that earnestness I lost when I was twelve. It’s not easy. It would be so much safer to avoid saying what I feel, or admitting what I want, or walking around with my heart flapping in the breeze. But it sure feels good to take off all those layers of steel.
I get why Pippa has to armor up these days. Adolescence is a fierce battle. I only hope that she figures out she doesn’t need it anymore once the battle is done.
