Mentor

More than six months ago, I decided to volunteer in a youth mentoring program, and contacted the Good Shepherd Organisation to join their ranks of mentors. A great organisation by the way, can't say enough goodness about it.

As part of the initial qualification process, I had to do two months of criminal background checks - and finally the records showed that indeed, I wasn't a registered paedophile. And then two months of reference checks - and Bobbis, Doobie and Jeet all extolled praise and virtue on my behalf. And then a battery of medical exams - the tuberculosis test, a chest x-ray, blood tests - and finally, finally, they declared me fit and ready to join the mentoring program.

As you can imagine, after six months of jumping hoops and hurdles, the anticipation and eagerness had built up in me like a puffer fish at bursting point. So finally when the coordinator called me one day at work to let me know they had found me a mentee, I couldn't help but whoop with joy.

"I have a Mini-Me!!!" I proclaimed excitedly.
"She'll probably be less mini than you," Delta pointed out.
"And you're not supposed to mould her to turn into you," Doobie pointed out.
Okay, so maybe not mini-me per se.

I was nervous the first day I met my mentee. Dressed a bit smarter than normal, unconsciously smoothed my hair all day, tried to think up teenage topics of conversation. Even bought a box of chocolates ("you can't buy her love, you know" MetroHom said unhelpfully).

I'd forgotten, even though its only been a few years, how much I'd changed since teenage-land. I took her to a healthfood store, and she made a beeline straight for the pizza.
One of the first things she asked me, when we met, was, "so, you much into R&B?"
"Er, heh heh, a little bit, you know, I er know some of the songs," I managed to splutter. Not that she was fooled, and I knew I'd have to earn my place by climbing back up in her ranks of coolness.

Mostly, I was just surprised by the maturity with which she approached the world. She knew she wanted to go to college. She knew what she wanted to study. She knew where she wanted to live, and that she wanted to adopt children, and the career she wanted to pursue for the rest of her life. I couldn't remember being quite that sure-footed when I was a senior in high school. I couldn't remember feeling that self-assuredness with which she faced the world.

Adolescent in her shyness, and yet adult beyond my years, in the way in which she'd learnt to deal with life. There's moments, (like the last time we met, when she said, "next week, why dont' you come over to my place and I'll cook you dinner,") when I actually find myself wondering who is indeed mentoring whom.