a rugs life

My daughter has an insatiable appetite for stories. In her perfect world, I’d tell stories non-stop from morning to night. 

But I put my foot down. A  mother is not an entertainment center. And this mother’s creative skills are limited.

However, I usually accomodate her with a few tales peppered throughout the day. Though even that feels like a stretch, sometimes.

The stories are variations on a few basic themes. The current one is the “Oh no I almost got caught by a - lion, alligator, bear, or whatever - but I escaped in the nick of time,” theme.  Recently the stories have been about sheep and rabbits who narrowly escape the lion’s teeth.

But my daughter has now started asking more of those difficult questions. For example, she worries about the lion. Where does he get his dinner? If he did not eat that sheep or rabbit, what does he eat? For a while, the lion ran off to another meadow and the story ended there. But lately, I’ve had to tell the awful truth: the lion does eventually catch a sheep, rabbit, squirrel or whatever, and the lion does eat it.

My daughter was stunned. He does? Does he eat a mommy sheep? a baby sheep? (god forbid)

It appears to be least upsetting to her if the lion eats an elderly daddy sheep.

I thought my daughter would stop asking for stories like this, now that the plot lines were so ‘realistic’, but she still wants them. And now she wants to know what part of the squirrel, sheep, chipmunk, does the lion eat first. And is the squirrel, sheep, chipmunk, dead? If so, how did it die?

I want out of these gruesome tales.  Can anyone help me make a graceful exit?

My daughter and I spent a wonderful Christmas in Baltimore with my sister and family friends.

I was amazed by the following photo. Chloe the cat started out the weekend hightailing it out of the room at the mere sight of my daughter, but by the last day she let Rada pet her and she actually purred, too.

This is the gaggle of girls that roamed my sister’s house for hours while the grown-ups cooked and chatted.

It was a really nice visit. The company was the best, the planes ran on time, the weather cooperated (more or less), and the food was drop-dead scrumptious.

My daughter didn’t want to leave the house. She didn’t want to get dressed, and she was ‘not ready’ to have breakfast.

When she point blank refused to brush her teeth, I felt the approach of a dead-end. I had already given her time-out for making a mess of my bedroom. So I suggested that we give her teeth time-out. But we were unable to ‘remove’ them from her mouth, and she found the whole endeavor way too funny for a weekday morning.

So I sighed, and headed for the bathroom to brush my own pearly whites. My daughter followed close behind, re-stating her refusal to brush hers. As I stood there, toothpaste foaming in my mouth, a ray of hope entered my mind. I realized that I could use the Bug Trick.

There was a risk that my daughter would recognize a re-use of an old ruse, but I decided to take the chance. I took my brush out of my mouth, looked up at the ceiling, and said, mustering up as much surprise and interest as can be mustered at 7:15 in the morning, “Oh! Look! A bug!”

My daughter was instantly engaged. She spun into action, looking all over the bathroom ceiling for the (phantom) bug. While she did this, I quietly took out her brush and added toothpaste. Then I gently turned her face to mine talking all the while about the possibility that the bug had flown into the kitchen. As I brushed her top teeth, I wondered out loud if perhaps the bug was hiding. Then I moved swiftly to her bottom teeth while outlining a plan of search. I handed her the cup of water which she deftly rinsed, spat out, and ran into the kitchen.

She looked for the bug a while longer in the kitchen and living room, and we concluded that it must be hiding. As we headed out the door, we decided to search for it again this evening when we got home….

Rada: “Everyone is gathered around Jesus to watch over and protect him.  Jay-Jay the airplane and Harold the helicopter are there to help. The donkey and cow are sitting in a bed of soft hay.”

I wasn’t able to get her to comment on the hippopotamus.

It was a snowy morning and when it snows I always take the bus.

But we missed the 7:35 due to some early morning household emergencies which are in themselves another story. And we got a late start getting to the 8:10, because of the millions of accoutrements one is required to wear in the snow.

As we were finally on our way walking towards the stop, I asked myself whether we would make it in time. My daughter, so entranced with the snow, was trailing around each corner, ooh-ing and ahh-ing at the white carpeted trees, sticking her tongue out to catch flakes, and stomping on small snow banks. I trudged beside her, trying to nudge her along, thinking of Arizona and asking myself why did I not move there, wracking my brain to remember why I stayed.

When we got to the bus stop, I bravely looked at my watch. 8:13 exactly. I sighed, looked down the snowy grey street, and wondered how to spend the next 22 minutes until the 8:35, or perhaps just throw myself at the mercy of a passing taxi….

So I stood there, staring down the street in silence and mild despair. Then, through the snow, I saw something utterly beautiful and ethereal wending its way towards me.

It was a bus.

It was a beautiful gray bus, missing one headlight, listing to one side as MBTA buses often do, and spewing brown smoke out the back. And this particular bus had the lovely number 85 displayed on the front of it. It stopped right in front of my daughter and me, and its doors magically opened. We stepped into the steamy odor of deisel fumes and sweat, jubilant for a small moment in time, saved, warm, happy.

For years I thought that a toy was something purchased from Target or FAO Schwartz. To my mind, it was a pre-designed item, intended for use by a child.

However, I have been re-educated.

A ‘toy’ is anything.  All it has to do is pull in a child’s attention.  In fact, it seems that the best ‘toys’ are rarely toys.

Currently Rada is entranced with Christmas lights. The lights are sitting on the floor, and when they’re all lit up, they play the role of some kind of ‘burning bush’ with her mardi gras beads as the strawberries that are growing on it…

The trains look on, with Sir Topham Hat making frequent comments.

I may be missing the finer points of her fantasy but the important thing is that she’s utterly engrossed in it… absorbed in Christmas lights.