Kellie Martin's Blog: Planting Seeds

Kellie is an Emmy-nominated actress who recently appeared on Lifetime’s Army Wives, and is perhaps best known for her work on ER and Life Goes On. She has assumed a new role with her takeover of ROMP, an online modern children’s boutique. Kellie is mom to 5-year-old daughter Maggie and hopes that ROMP will "inspire conscious, thoughtful parenting practice and will, in turn, help moms feel confident and fulfilled.” 

When I was 8 months pregnant, a wacky woman who worked at the place where I bought food for my dog and cat told me that my daughter was going to be just like Mother Theresa. No, I hadn’t told her that I was having a girl. Like I said, she was wacky and, for no reason at all, seemed to know way too much about me and my fetus. She also asserted that my daughter would “bring home strays.” Dog, cats . . . people? I wondered. Sadly, she didn’t specify.

I didn’t think much of this until my daughter was about 10 months old and discovered the plush Gandhi doll perched on top of my shelf. Yes, I do own a plush Gandhi doll complete with cool circular glasses and removable sandals, doesn’t everybody? From that day forward Maggie started packing plush Gandhi around with her wherever she went. Thinking back on the aforementioned wacky lady, this freaked me out.

Actually, it freaked me out but also made me immensely proud—my daughter didn’t reach for Minnie Mouse up on the top shelf, she reached for Gandhi. My kid’s deep! I think that she initially dug plush Gandhi’s cool circular glasses and removable sandals, but here I saw a teaching opportunity:

Me:  “Maggie, that’s Gandhi.”

Maggie:  (with faux recognition) “Ohh.”

Me:  “He was a great man who taught the world a lot of important lessons.”

Maggie:  (throwing plush Gandhi in the air) “Wheee-ee!” 

So . . . maybe she’s not just like Mother Theresa. 

Obviously a 10 month old is not going to comprehend the enormity of a Gandhi and what he meant to this world. The cool thing is that, when Maggie discovered the Gandhi doll on the top of my shelf, the seed was planted. Now that Maggie’s 5 years old, I can start to tell her about who Gandhi was and why he’s important to us. She’s already interested in him—already loves him—so it’s not much of a stretch to get her to want to learn about his lessons of peace.

So maybe she’ll bring home a few strays (hopefully they will be dogs or cats). And, wacky as it is, if peace, acceptance, non-violence, and love are all I can teach my kid, I’ll be pretty happy with that.

More from Kellie Martin:

• The Loneliest Number
• Curly Joe and the Meaning of Life
• The Sky’s Not the Limit

You can find Kellie on Twitter, Facebook and at her awesome online shop, ROMP.