Faculty Perspective “Small moments of close examination seem all the more essential in this new world.”
Watching her
O
ur daughter Malia, born in our third week at Milton, has discovered her hands. She swirls and jerks them before her eyes, fanning her fingers to examine each. Her gestures are inimitable to adult hands: she points with her pinkie, not her index finger; her hands jump with unexpected speed. With arm extended, she examines a fist as big as a plum. We watch, entranced, as she continually studies something so near and so new. We arrived at Milton just five months ago from a very different life of teaching at The American School in Switzerland. We had left teaching lives at Groton School (Tarim) and the University of Massachusetts / Amherst (Lisa) to spend two sumptuous, challenging years in the Italian-speaking Swiss canton of Ticino, an hour north of Milan. We knew we wanted upheaval then, eager to know how living abroad could translate to humility and invigoration. But the imminent arrival of Malia sparked an urge for home.
Indeed, Malia’s hand motions are not new to her. She was all limbs in utero but now relearns motions in her new gaseous, not fluid, world. Her discovery of her hands is self-consciousness in the purest sense, an awareness of her body’s ability to move concurrent with physical development. We realize that we, too, are repeating old motions. We had unpacked a house before. We had bought a car. We had sat through opening faculty meetings at other schools. Yet in a new setting, every motion is inflected with newness. And then there is the baby, who gives all old life processes – sleeping, showering, eating – new definition. But we find, as the nation post 9/11 too discovers, that repetition of old movement (focusing on the familiar) eases acclimation to the new. Slowly, through daily rehearsals, we have slid happily into the rhythms of crossing Centre Street and dodging the rugby scrum
that is known as “lunch time” in Forbes, as well as the nocturnal tides of bedtime, bleary-eyed changings and feedings. Small moments of close examination seem all the more essential in this new world. So we learn from Malia to take stock, to study something – even the obvious – hard and well. Malia is preparing her interaction with the world around her. When her hand successfully grabs an object and moves it to her mouth, all that intense examination pays off. There is a huge grin. She would like to try that again. Life does not depend on close examination. But perhaps the last year has taught us that focused study forges more deliberate, careful connections within this complex world, allowing us to move on, to grow up. Tarim Chung and Elisabeth Baker (English Department)
For us, 2001 ushered wholesale changes: new jobs, new school, new home and new baby. We have found a comfortable fit at Milton with its warm faculty and cosmopolitan campus. Maybe best of all, Malia was showered with gifts and good wishes when she was born. Our favorite pastime, as an anodyne to all this change, is watching Malia watch herself. These are sweet moments, which have allowed us to adjust to the cultural landscape of Milton Academy as well as displace the images of the catastrophic tumbling Towers that infiltrated our lives just five days before she was born.
Tarim Chung, Elisabeth Baker and their daughter, Malia
36 Milton Magazine