Liking Them Apples

September 15, 2022

The Honeycrisps are just starting to ripen throughout the Northeast. I love me a good Honeycrisp; they're the Michael Jordan of apples. When you look at Honeycrisp cells under a microscope, they're about twice the size of other apple cells. They're one of the best-tasting apples to bite into raw, and one of the most difficult to grow.

Granny Smith apples originally come from Australia. They like a climate on the warmer side, but you can grow them in Zone 5 if you're patient and allow them a long ripening season. In fact, if you let them ripen naturally on the tree, they're sweeter than the variety you'll typically find in a grocery store.

You can plant a Granny Smith apple tree right next to a Honeycrisp apple tree. You can nurture them similarly and shoo the pests away from both. But nothing you can do will make that Granny Smith apple ripen at the same time as a Honeycrisp apple. Each has its own distinct nature, its own schedule, its own rhythm.

So it goes with children. If you have more than one, you've probably recognized that each one has its own distinct nature, its own schedule, its own rhythm. We know this, although we nevertheless tend to think that as long as we treat our kids the same, and nurture them well, we can expect essentially the same results. But almost invariably, one will be a Honeycrisp and another will be a Granny Smith and another will be a Gala. They'll walk at their own pace, and learn Algebra at their own pace, and become scientists or artists or welders or teachers or managers or programmers or publishers or whatever their soul leads them to do, all at their own pace. Theirs, not yours. And not their brother's.
 
Look around at your Facebook friends from high school: As a rule, are today's happiest, healthiest, most engaged and productive adults the same people who were the stars from way back when? Probably not. The Granny Smiths who found what they love to do and work hard at it are doing just as well as the Honeycrisps.

Sweet.

—Deb