Too much consistency is as bad for the mind as it is for the body. Consistency is contrary to nature, contrary to life. The only completely consistent people are the dead. → Aldous Huxley
I have talked about how my sister's husband is being transferred and they will be moving in late July to Dallas. The picture above is from the last trip home to the farm. The impending loss of my sister's girls has been really hard on me. I think that I have cried more in the past month than I have in the past 3 years combined. One of the things that I find most troubling is the lack of diverse influences the girls will have down there. My sister and her husband are extremely conservative. While the girls were here at least they would always have their crazy Aunt Paige, which is how my brother in law considers and often refers to me, to give them a healthy dose of other creative inspirations.
My sister and I got in an argument yesterday. The girls are currently in a parochial school. They are going down to Dallas this week to look at schools and neighborhoods that they are considering. It seems that the areas they are looking at have very good public schools and very few parochial options yet they are still leaning towards sending the girls to private schools. I just don't get it. With Jess I at least partially understand, she is pretty emotionally needy and they want a small school where she will get plenty of attention and experience less change with the transition. But Kate is extremely advanced and was literally being ignored in her current class. Private schools are great for students who fall somewhere in the middle but in my opinion they just don't meet the needs of students on either end of the extremes.
I know that is clearly not my decision but I feel very strongly about this. Angie's argument was that she felt that there was much more moral teaching in the private schools and that there is less exposure to media influences, whatever that means. I just see them being completely sheltered and having no exposure to differences which to me is a bad thing. I don't want them to get a spoiled rich girl mentality which is already starting to show a little in Jess. I don't want them to be surrounded by all privileged white people with no idea what it is like for the rest of the world and no exposure to other ideas and ways of thinking.
My sister said that if they could afford it and they thought it was the best thing for the girls than why wouldn't they do it. I couldn't really argue with that, since it is their decision and they have to do what they feel is best. My sister always fights dirty though and had to throw a punch at my weakness. She said that she thinks that Anh and Kai, my niece and nephew on my husband's side, are much more influenced by the "media" and are so much more worldly for their age. I spend a lot more time with them as they live just a few blocks from us and their mother has progressively worse health problems as well as other reasons. Ani actually goes to a Montessori school so there really wasn't an argument there to be made, she just wanted to get a dig in. Yes, Kai and Anh have a very unique style and are much more aware of the world but to me that is not a bad thing.
I'm afraid now that my arguments probably just strengthened Angie's convictions. When I said that they would have no exposure to any diversity I got nothing but condescension. What do you think, should I just keep my nose out of it? I know it's not my decision but I also know I will continue to fight for the girls and try to keep them from being completely sheltered from the world.
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