“Unbecoming”

un·be·com·ing
adjective
1. (of behavior) not fitting or appropriate; unseemly

Oh, goodness. Guys, I’ll be the first one to tell you. My (almost) 5 year old is actually a hot mess. His IQ is somewhere between “I get it, you’re smarter than me” and “shut the heck up already”…. 🙃

But seriously. This child has a very specific, seriously old school British accent and speech pattern going on? And I don’t get it. I don’t understand the influence, I’m not fancy. Like, kid. Trust me, I LOVE grammar and proper sentence structure as much as the next guy… but sometimes you come up with things that I’m sure I’ve never said to you.

For years, he’s always said weird shit. He said “as well” instead of “too” or “also”. Like…consistently. And it’s hilarious and amazing. “ Oh, I love that as well!” (I’m just…I’m not sure what other 4 year old says that every single time.) He also has a very strange (yet very intelligible) speech impediment that quite literally only makes him sound more British. It’s so odd. I love it the most.

He says shit like “as well”, and “very well, then” and “that’s rubbish”. And I’ll never ever correct him. Because it’s just too awesome.

Lately, he’s started saying “unbecoming”. Again…I just have absolutely no idea where he’s picking this all up from. My guess is books, we read hundreds of books a week…I guess some are just quite impressionable?

He said it the first time over the weekend. He was with my husband and I wasn’t there. Later that same day, I happened to have a minor spray foam insulation mishap/emergency…. (Seriously, if it says wear gloves…WEAR GLOVES!!!!)

But my son was in the kitchen watching me try to get it off my hands, and I guess at some point during that time, he was going to imply that my reaction to my skin literally burning and blistering my hands was unbecoming. I had no idea of this, but my husband shot him a look that basically suggested he shut the heck up.

It’s funny, because my husband later told me this story. He told me that he told my son not to say it because he knew I was upset in that moment and stressed and it “wasn’t a good time”.

I mean…he was surely right. I was a bit stressed and trying SO hard to keep my cool in front of my kids…

But seriously? If my 4 year old had looked at me in that moment and said “mommy, this is unbecoming right now”…I absolutely would have lost my shit and started laughing.

My husband was right. It was the worst time for it. Which actually made it the best time for it.

The funny thing is that he’s so not wrong. Because as I was writing this post, I found this quote….

“Maybe the journey
isnt so much about
becoming anything.
Maybe it’s about
unbecoming
everything that isn’t
really you,
so you can be who
you were meant to
be in the first place.”

And just…how true is that? How fitting is that for my life right now? My son suggested that I was unbecoming. And he surely wasn’t wrong. I spend so much effort trying to become something. Trying to find myself, grow, heal…but maybe that’s wrong. Maybe first, before I can do all of that… I actually literally need to…. unbecome?

And maybe only then can I really, well, become who I hope to be?

I heard him say it again the next day, to his brother. He built a tower out of blocks. And he asked his brother “do you like it? Or do you think it’s unbecoming?”

I just about died of laughter.

This child makes me absolutely crazy. He is SO hard to parent in all of the best ways. I grieve for his future knowing full well it might not exist. I get frustrated when he isn’t living up to his highest potential…because this kid is hot shit. And he knows it. And my unfair expectations of him want him to live up to it NOW, because tomorrow may not come.

He single handedly brings out the worst in me…and the very best in me.

I see my success in his success. I want nothing but absolute awesomeness for him. And I know he can do it.

Because I’m sorry. But anything less than amazing for him would just simple be unbecoming. And that would just be rubbish.

Very well, then.