Different from the Start

Five-year-old Albert Einstein stared at his hand as if it held magic. Cupped in his palm was a small，round instrument with a glass cover and a jiggling needle. Albert's father called it a compass. Albert called it a mystery. No matter how he moved the compass, the needle always pointed to the north. Quietly Hermann Einstein watched his son. Albert was a chubby little boy with pale, round cheeks and thick, black hair that was usually messy. His bright brown eyes were wide with discovery.

Something was in the room with him, Albert realized--something he couldn't see or feel, but that acted on the compass just the same. Spellbound, Albert listened to his father explain magnetism, the strange force that made the compass needle point north. But nothing his father said made the invisible power seem less mysterious or wonderful. To many children the compass would have been just another toy. To Albert the compass was a miracle he would never forget.

But then Albert had always been different from other children. Born March 14，1879，in Ulm, Germany, Albert hadn't been looked like other babies. As she cradled her new son in her arms, Pauline Einstein thought the back of his head looked strange. Other babies didn't have such large, pointed skulls. Was something wrong with Albert? Although the doctor told Pauline everything was fine, several weeks passed before the shape of Albert's head began to look right to her.

When Albert was one, his family moved to Munich，where his sister, Maja, was born a year later. Looking down at the tiny sleeping bundle, Albert was puzzled. Where were the baby's wheels? The disappointed two year old wanted to know. Albert had expected a baby sister to be something like a toy, and most of his toys had wheels.

Albert's parents were amused by his confusion. But any response at all would have delighted them. At an age when many children have lots to say, Albert seemed strangely backward. Hermann and Pauline wondered why he was so late in talking. Was their son developing normally? As Albert grew older, he continued to have trouble putting his thoughts into words Even when he was nine years old, he spoke slowly, if he decided to say anything at all. Pauline and Hermann didn't know what to think.

But Albert was a good listener and a good thinker. Sometimes when he went hiking with his parents and Maja, he thought about his father's compass and what it had revealed to him. The clear, open meadows were filled with more than the wind or the scent of flowers. They were also filled with magnetism. The very thought of it quickened Albert's pulse.

In the evenings, Albert's house rang with his father's merry voice and his mother's music. Pauline Einstein was a talented pianist who wanted her son to study music too. At age six, Albert began to take violin lessons. Like many young children, he didn't like to practice. But he wanted to please his mother, so he dutifully stuck his violin under his chin and played his scales.

There were so many things Albert would rather do than practice, He liked to day dream, play with blocks, and build houses out of playing cards. Sometimes his paper buildings reached fourteen stories high. He rarely played with other children, except Maja. Albert had a hard time making friends. He was quiet at school and didn't like sports. Other boys his age liked to play soldier and march stiffly around the playground. Albert wanted nothing to do with soldiers.