When my son decided he wanted to study animal behavior in college – even less practical than studying English – I realized that this was my fault. I raised him at the zoo.
At about the same time that I was reproducing, so were the gorillas at Woodland Park Zoo. I figured I would get better lessons on motherhood by watching them than from reading books or listening to my own mother, whose bragging points about her children included early toilet training.
“All my children were toilet trained by age 2,” she announced whenever the subject came up. “Sherry would only use pink paper.” (In my defense, I was too young to know that white is more environmentally responsible.)
I had a hunch that early weaning, early toilet training and early reading had contributed to my high anxiety and low spirit of adventure. If I wanted to raise a happy child, I had only to imitate the experts instead of my mother.
Nina, the matriarch of the gorillas at Woodland Park, was an experienced and successful mother. No beauty, she was an earth mother type with a round belly and short stature. Just like people, gorillas have to learn how to be parents, and some reject their offspring for unknown reasons.
Nina knew what she was doing. Hanging out with her baby Zuri, born less than a year before mine, she was totally relaxed. For his first few months, Zuri never even set foot on the ground. When he was ready to visit with his huge silverback father or totter around, he ventured off while Nina kept watch, but did not interfere. When Zuri wanted to be carried, Nina did not leave him to “cry it out,” as had been popular during my childhood. She carried the baby, and Zuri clung for as long as he wanted to.
Nina played, lying on her back and dangling Zuri above her stomach by one arm, tickling the baby, both mother and child with open-mouthed play faces and silent laughter. The prime ingredient, I noticed, was lots of body contact. The kid liked to be carried.
So, it turned out, did mine.
Right after I got home from the hospital with a 6-pound, 7-ounce addition to the diaper industry, I resumed exercising and promptly got a muscle spasm in my neck that led to headaches that led to a doctor visit. The addition, now named Marty, accompanied me in his well-padded, plastic-sided baby carrier that had all the proper auto-safety stamps. I sat in the chair and put the carrier on the floor beside me. Marty promptly started yelling; I broke into a sweat. The doctor and I shouted back and forth for a while over the kid’s screams. The doc said, “He’s very demanding.” Well, he should know; I had no idea of how human babies behaved.
Marty’s wanting to be carried all the time made sense in gorilla terms. Unlike other babies, he did not like the cloth sling. He wanted to be upright; he wanted to see what was going on. Best of all was being held in my arms with his head looking over my shoulder, from which perch he would smile and babble at people
Not only did I take parenting lessons from the gorillas, but, since I served on the zoo’s board of directors, Marty grew up surrounded by animals. He thought it was normal to hand the elephants carrots or see a giraffe’s tongue inches from his face.
I got a clue of his interests during a visit to the elephants when he was a year or two old. He wanted me to pick him up so that he could see better. I picked him up. He watched Bamboo, Chai and Sri walk leisurely around their pen, occasionally picking up a piece of hay. Other children stopped, looked, left. My arms started to ache.
“Don’t you want to go see some other animals now?” I asked.
“No.”
When my circulation started to go, I asked, “Ready to see the wallabies?”
“No.”
“How about a tiger?”
“I’m watching elephants.”
It was one of those telling parental moments when, despite your agony, you are proud of your child. This kid was focused and confident and he knew what he wanted. He finally gave me the nod and we moved on.
It was zoo-like at home, too. We had the Airedale, the chickens, the ducks and the parrots. We had the raccoons and the opossums and coyotes that tried to eat the chickens. We had the pet worms, Spike and Movearound. Both Marty’s father and I believed that a person learns to be humane by treating animals well.
I reap what I have sown. My son will get an advanced degree and venture off to some obscure rainforest to study poisonous frogs. Instead of his supporting me in my old age, I’ll be supporting him when his grant money runs out.
But I won’t worry about any of that – not much intimidates a successful mother gorilla.
Sherry Rind has written about parrots, people, chickens and dogs – and her son, Marty. She lives in Bothell, where she is at work on a book about urban chicken-keeping.
This article first appeared in the November 2007 issue of Seattle's Child.
