Mother, candy, and the psyche

IF my adopted girls go to Chinese class, they get candy. Any kind. Bribery is not a noble parenting tool, but I'm here to say it's efficient, convenient and practical. Any guilt I feel fades away when we come out of class and they're singing those Chinese songs, drilling each other on the Mandarin words for moon, star and underpants. They love it.
  Someday, they'll thank me. I'll be a hero. They'll say, "Thanks, Mum, for making us learn Chinese," when they're all grown up and visiting the orphanages that once housed them.
  Now, we're in the car on the way to class, and they're trying to decide which candy they'll choose. We pass Sunshine Kids, the place where Anna, 7, went to preschool. "That was my first school!" she announces to her younger sister, Sasha.
  "I know," Sasha answers. "You tell me this every week."
  She does. Today she goes further, and begins naming every teacher she's ever had, and then every babysitter she's ever had. Soon Anna has taken out a pen and a notebook, and is doing the tally.
  "So that means I had seven teachers," she says, "seven babysitters and two mums." Two mums? Well, now wait a second. Where did that come from? And she's just talking about this so ... casually?
  "Two mums?" I ask.
  "You and the one whose belly I came out of," she says.
  Well, glory be. We've had so many frank discussions over so many years about what it means to be adopted, and it has never, before now, seemed to have even entered their minds. Whenever I come to the subject, my children appear bored with it. So I don't push. I go for the factual, simple declarative: Some kids are raised by their birth mothers, some by birth fathers, some by adoptive parents and so on. And my kids practically yawn at me. This is the first time either has brought it up on her own.
  "So, do you girls remember your birth mothers?" I ask, gently prodding. If the records are correct, neither would have spent more than about a day with the woman who gave birth to her. Anna was found on the steps outside a hospital. Sasha was found in a cardboard box by a pharmacy.
  "I don't remember her," Anna says, "But I think she had long hair. Probably longer than Sasha's had."
  "Mine had short hair," Sasha says, wisely surrendering.
  "Do you think they were nice?" I ask.
  "I think mine like to sing," Anna says.
  "Yeah, mine, too!" Sasha says.
  "Well, I never got to meet them," I say. "But I met some of the women in the orphanages who took care of you, and they were all nice."
  "That's right," Anna says. "How many of them did I have?"
  "I don't know," I tell her. "I mean, there were a lot of people there."
  "I'm just gonna say six," she says, and then takes a moment to come up with her grand total. "Twenty-two. I've had 22 ladies watching over me. Wow. That's a lot of love for one kid," she says, mimicking the way I talk to her about such things.
  "Snickers," Sasha says, out of nowhere. "I forgot about Snickers bars. I think that's what I'm going to pick today for my candy."
  Right. I forgot, too. Teachers, birth mothers, candy, all part of a well-balanced psyche.

A light ignites thought

  "COULD I ..." she begins, all summer legs and some subtle perfume, and there is a subtle summer rustle and flutter of one of those silky things women wear around their neck and waist for very few reasons other than to make themselves rustle and flutter, and that's not the problem. This is: after the "could I ..." comes the phrase "borrow a light?"
  Because I was in a summery mood, and because she was rustling and fluttering, I didn't really mind. I have learnt, down the years, to try not to impose my predilections about English and its use on strangers. So, last night, because of the perfume, and the rustling stuff, it was easy to say yes, and not worry about the borrowing aspect. She smoked, and smiled, and left.
  And then, a minute or two later, someone asked if it was OK to borrow the unused chair. Yes, absolutely. It's not my chair. This is a pub. Why ask me? But then, another minute or two later, someone else came across and asked sorry mate can I borrow a cigarette.
  And, yes, I did get a little bit antsy. I gave him a cigarette. I huffed a little, for a while, wondering about the social process, and the growing misuse of the word "borrow". But still, it was a summery day, and I was able to entertain a slightly enjoyable imagination about how I would have forgive a number of grammatical mistakes if the rustling woman had wanted to borrow something else such as my trousers: but then he came back, 10 minutes later, and asked if he could "borrow" another cigarette.
  No, frankly. When are you going to give it back? Are you really meaning "borrow"? Are you really going, in half an hour or something's time, to leave this place and walk out with your stupid three-quarter-length shorts and your pointlessly large-breasted girlfriend, and go and buy some smokes and then come all the way back and give me two? Are you? No, you're not.
  I didn't say all this, of course: I simply said "No". But it did get me thinking. Borrowing is a fascinating and old and grand concept. There are some things which can still, legitimately, be borrowed. Passed from one to another and, later, with good faith on both sides, given back. Money, for instance. Food. Livestock.
  And here are some things it's just not right to "borrow". Cigarettes. Girlfriends. Ideas. "That's a great idea, I might just borrow it." Yes it is and no you won't. Time. "Can I borrow your time?" No, because, in fact, you are not borrowing it you are stealing it, like the cigarettes.
  As long as we can all remember this we might, I think, just be able to become better people. And all we need to improve after that is how not to end up being the kind of person who can make an existential hash out of giving a pretty girl a light.