Sometimes, alternative gifted children end up in pioneer camps. If a child is not socially dangerous and is capable of taking care of themselves, parents should be praised for sending such children to camp. Without this experience, these children will never socialize. However, children can be cruel, and if a fool ends up in a group, there is a high likelihood of bullying.
Once, a boy named Roma joined my group. I managed to shape the behavior of the other children so that they felt responsible for their friend and wouldn’t let anyone bully him. Fortunately, Roma was potty-trained and was as reasonable as an average three-year-old. At 12, he looked at the world with the same sincerity and naivety. He expected only kindness and cried bitterly if someone took away his toy.
I, in turn, taught Roma to answer the question “What do you want to be?” with “An astronaut,” turning Roma into a living quote from anecdote I can’t say that I was mocking Roma in this way. I taught a similar phrase to my three-year-old cousin once, and many years later, to my older daughter. It’s time to teach the youngest one too 🙂 And whenever I introduced Roma to my camp counselor colleagues or anyone else, I would immediately ask him, “So, what do you want to be?” And Roma, with a smile on his face and a silly intonation, would reply, “A-as-tron-aut.”
Roma’s parents were somehow acquainted with the camp management and, finding me a protector for their son, who was bullied in all other cases, arranged for Roma to be placed in my group, even though he often didn’t fit into the age group I was leading. But one day, Roma arrived at the camp before I did, and he was assigned to a group with two young female interns. When I arrived, I told the interns about Roma, explained how to set the other kids up, and also showed them a joke about a cosmonaut. Roma really liked it too, by the way.
And so, one day, those camp counselors came running to me with wide eyes and said, “Roma, help! Your Roma climbed up a pine tree and can’t get down!” I replied, “Why is he mine?” But everyone knew he was yours. Besides, you can get him down! I didn’t understand the depths of female logic, but I went. From a distance, I realized the complexity of the situation. Sitting high up in a very tall pine tree, somehow having gotten there, was Roma, smiling. He always smiled. I approached the tree and asked, “Roma, how did you get up there?”
— I’m already an astronaut! — Roma replied joyfully, looking at me from a bird’s-eye view.