I remember reading in James Dobson’s book Bringing Up Boys many years ago that one significant difference between boys’ behavior and girls’ behavior is this: boys will climb a piece of furniture, fall off, injure themselves, and climb right back onto the furniture, repeating the cycle until they conquer it (or find something else to occupy their time and energy). Girls on the other hand will climb once, fall once, and learn from their injury not to climb up again.

It hit me this morning that my daughter has not yet displayed this typical girl behavior, when I observed her climb the school chair, tumble to the floor, cry, and immediately turn toward the chair to climb up again. Before that, she was found climbing/falling off/climbing/falling off the boys’ bunk bed ladder. During our recess outside today, she showed the same resolve as she attempted to conquer the front porch step. Here is a brief chronicle of it all.