Teresa Strasser by Teresa Strasser

I got some bad news about my toddler this week. It turns out, at least according to his day care provider, he is not "confident."

This is, of course, a disaster.

When this was brought to my attention, I did the obvious and measured thing and immediately decided that his lack of confidence is totally a reflection on my poor parenting and my even worse DNA, and that it is basically a catastrophe to be examined ad nauseam with all blame placed squarely on me, his non-confident mom. This is how I approach things, with a combination of panic and myopia. I know what you're thinking: "You should write a self-help book!" I know.

Having only one child so far, I have a small statistical sampling of one. With so little data available to me on the relative confidence of 2-year olds, I really thought mine was just fine. But no, says the day care lady. "He isn't exactly the most confident child in the world."

That phrasing suggests that, as his mom, it was probably obvious to me, but it wasn't. The evidence of this lack of confidence is that Buster arrives at the place, grabs a toy and plays by himself for a while. I was instructed to get him there earlier in the morning so he can connect better with other kids before they establish playgroups from which he may currently be excluded.

This news was shattering.

And it made me wonder: What is so great about confidence? So my kid will never be on a reality show, where the main draw seems to be supremely confident half-wits with no discernible gifts but boatloads of excess "Look at Me." So my kid will hover by the appetizers for half an hour at a party before mingling, if he mingles at all, which will make him exactly like both of his parents.

My husband spent most of his teen years playing Rush songs on the guitar alone in his basement while people in his family probably quietly questioned his heterosexuality. He's the kindest, warmest, smartest person I know — and he can play the heck out of "The Camera Eye" based on his loser-like basement dedication to his instrument — but he hangs back in social situations.

Let's take a moment to celebrate introspective types who sit by themselves with a toy before they warm up to people.

I desperately wanted my child to be confident, perhaps because his life would be easier and perhaps because that would somehow reflect on my superb parenting. But let's remember that those prone to keeping to themselves tend to invent stuff and write books and design motherboards. Or, they work as file clerks and live solitary lives filled with frozen chicken pot pie dinners and Internet porn. I'm kind of scarred right now, so can you just let me imagine that my child, who at least one person sees as "not the most confident child in the world," will be more Jonas Salk than Boo Radley?

Now that I think about it, confident people have always kind of bothered me. If you do a lot of completely understandable and really smart self-promoting, there is a good chance I resent and judge you. The more you love yourself the more I don't love you. Insecure people, those with a little stammer or an eye-contact problem, you are my people. I am drawn to you because, while I do a decent job of simulating normal, quasi-confident human behavior, I really would rather grab a toy and sit in the corner.

We value confidence, but it comes dangerously close to entitlement, and that is a real buzz kill, if you ask me, and possibly more dangerous to young people than high-fructose corn syrup or matches. Those of us who walk around thinking we deserve attention, praise, companionship and money just because we are so awesome, well, to quote my child, "I don't like that."

Sure, there's much real estate between "doesn't play with others" and ends up on MTV setting his junk on fire for attention, but I have to do what moms do: decide that my child will be just fine the way he is, exactly the way he is, because that's what I get. Or maybe I could just get him to day care earlier and see how that goes.

Teresa Strasser is an Emmy-winning television writer, a two-time Los Angeles Press Club Columnist of the Year and a multimedia personality. She is the author of a new book, "Exploiting My Baby," the rights to which have been optioned by Sony Pictures. To find out more about Teresa Strasser and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

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