What truly got me writing again, however (because there's always the reason and then the real reason, the intellectual motivation and then the one or two plucks to your hidden emotional strings that vibrate much longer and more galvanizingly than any prodding of the mind can do), was a compliment to my writing by a kind and generous-souled friend who received my annual Christmas email (in March of course). The other pluck was my Dad's first blog, at least that I've ever read, which I just perused (and now it's real, right Daddy?) and thoroughly enjoyed and said to myself, why doesn't he write more? Why has it taken him so long? Um...er...eek. Guess I'd better get writing too.
So, the story. Every week (that we aren't sick, ugh) a friend from church, a dear lady, "Miss Sally" to Annelise our three-year-old, comes over to babysit for the twins while I take said three-year-old grocery shopping. She also cleans whatever most needs cleaning in our house. Yes, now that the cat's out of the bag I'll be the envy of half the town (of course the "other half" has a nanny or cleaning service). All this just for having twins! Anyway, she is one of those motherly women who could lull me to sleep on the spot (well, I am incredibly sleep deprived, but still) with her calm tone and I'll-take-care-of-you demeanor. She is also on the more conservative side, in a moral vs political (though she is that too) sense. I say this to set the scene for my story.
As she was leaving one day, after folding our laundry and scrubbing our kitchen floor (this is love!), I told Annelise to say good-bye to Miss Sally. Can you hear it coming, the where-one-earth-did-that-come-from out of a toddler's mouth? "Good-bye, you beautiful witch!" What??!! I'm proud to say that my composure faltered only for a moment when my tone dipped from "Where did you..." and back to a normal "...hear that?" with the "that" a little too high-pitched. "On Little Bear." Little Bear? The sweetest cleanest cartoon on the planet, and to the sweetest cleanest lady we know? "Oh, well, you'll have to show me that part...." At which point Miss Sally, who had taken it all very well I must say, said they knew Little Bear too (except I think she meant a book series by that name that I vaguely remember from childhood--oh I need to find that at the library!--and not the cartoon) and wasn't it crazy how kids see things from a different perspective than we do, and went on to elaborate til I was assured that she was not offended. (Women have their own secondary language in these things, running underneath the things we actually say.)
That evening I repeated the story to Steve. He said, "Oh yeah, it's on Little Bear. On 'Prince Little Bear.' Little Bear says it to Hen. He's pretending to be the prince in the story, and makes Hen be the witch." (Guess who also watches Little Bear around here, inadvertently of course. Ahem.) And a day or two later I saw the scene of such import myself. Hen doesn't want to be the witch, but Little Bear says she can be a beautiful witch and then says in a cheery, sing-song voice as he walks away, "Good-bye, you beautiful witch." Ha, repeated verbatim by our resident Sponge. Eek, what else is she soaking up? Hopefully good stuff.
I paused the Roku right there, and we had a little talk. Witches are bad ladies, Little Bear and Hen were just pretending, and we don't call anyone a witch. (Least of all Miss Sally!) Later she mentioned "witch" again so I said we weren't going to watch that episode until she could stop fixating on that tiny little part. I think she stopped. But why did she start in the first place?? The mind of a child, who can plumb the depths?
All in all, it gave me something to laugh at into the bedclothes when I couldn't sleep for a too-large chunk of the night (which is no laughing matter when sleep is as precious as it is around here), and reminded me that she really is listening. To EVERYthing. Even when she does't seem to be. Guess I should try never to act like a witch. Even a beautiful one.
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