You Are a Princess! - Second Place, Wallace Prize for Nonfiction
This morning, Joan Genest’s first order of business is piggy toes.
“What’s he doing these days, besides sleeping?” Rene, Joan’s husband, directs his question at Marcus’s parents. Assessing Marcus’s infant abilities is crucial to planning the session. “Is he sitting?” He is. “Crawling, walking, riding bikes, doing complex math problems?” Rene’s joking now, but the next question is important: “When you put him on his back, does he grab his feet?”
Marcus is a mild-mannered boy with a sweater vest and enormous cheeks. He is here so that Joan and Rene Genest, proprietors of...
