An Apple and An Orange

I know we're not supposed to compare twins. It's like the Cardinal Rule of multiples - you can't compare two different children despite their exposure to the exact same environment. They are, after all, still two different people. ... but man is that hard! How are you not supposed to do that? It's like when you're mother taught you not to stare at people, but then a 400lb Elvis impersonator in his 80's walks by. Or how they tell you don't look at the accident on the side of the road, just keep driving. But have you ever passed a ball of twisted metal with a 30 foot flame and not turned your head like the "we are legion" girl from The Exorcist? So how now (brown cow) can I not compare two girls who have been exposed to the same exact conditions for the past 8 months? If one gets sick and the other doesn't how can I not pause and wonder why?! They wore the same cloths in the same temperatures to the same place where they saw the same people. How is it one reacted one way and the other reacted totally different? The latest problem I have is with the crawling. Arianna is like a pinball, bouncing from one object to the next at breakneck speeds. As soon as she arrives at her destination, she plots a new course and is of in a blur of arms and legs. Genevieve, my sweet Genevieve, goes pretty much no where. At all. Ever. She's grasped the concept. She knows that movement requires her to be on her belly, and she's figured out that the arms and the legs play a key role, so she gets on her knees, rocks a little bit and then just kind of melts back in to the floor where she flops around a few times before crying. And my problem is not that she can't do it. I know that all kids develop differently, some kids take longer to crawl, some don't do it at all. My problem is I feel so bad for her because I think she really wants to. She watches her sister zoom around and she acts like she wants to go to. Or her sister comes and steals a toy from her and takes off with it and there's nothing that Geneveive can do but watch. So rather than think I have any disappointment I want to make it clear that I don't - I just feel bad for her and I want her to be able to do the things she wants. But when I try and work with her (get her on her knees, move her hands and legs, ect.) she only shows interest in standing up and trying to walk. Part of me thinks that she's come to the conclusion "why settle for matching my sister when I can just best her. If I can walk first while she's still crawling, then I'll have the upper hand." Maybe that's the subtext - we'll never know for sure. I'm just having a really tough time accepting that they are different people who will do things differently, and that's OK. It's almost like I just want them to be even, that way no one is left out or feeling better/worse about life. But that's the human condition, isn't it. If not for those feelings the idea of greatness would not exist. Can you imagine Neil Armstrong landing on the moon and planting 180+ flags for all the other countries who could not figure out how to get there? That would kind of take the fun out of things. It's easier to do when your kids are not at the same level, side by side in life. You can separate them easier when there's a one year, two year, ten year gap. But this is my problem, not there's. As far as they are concerned - life is going great, whether you're crawling like mad or just sitting and enjoying the scenery.