I was a girl in the early 1960’s that wasn’t supposed to show that I was smart. Mostly, I hid it because I had geek written all over me. I wanted to be, and could have been smart in math but had to take home economics. The feminist in me asked for shop class but that didn’t allow girls.
My husband was the opposite, he grew up on a dairy farm and became a physicist and software engineer. He got the biggest glasses because for the first time, it allowed his poor eyes to see the world for the first time as a child. And he was proud to wear those glasses even though it made him a geek.
We never would have met except for fate but have been matched for over a decade because we did meet.
Parents, please don’t push French classes or others at your toddlers, but allow them room to grow and don’t diminish them in any way. If they choose math and science with some liberal arts so to smooth the edges they’ll be able to choose their way in the world. Dee
ps When I was 16 I won a ping pong game against a local boy and he said I should have let him win. The other day I played my first game of table shuffleboard and beat a guy by one point and he stormed out of the room. What has changed?