Category: she said

While TheWeeOne was playing this evening with a clear Orbeez* which practically disappears in water I thought to invent a riddle, ya know, on the fly.
It took just a second but I KNEW at least one answer was rock-solid.

What can you feel but not see, touch but not grab?

LaGrande, perked up quickly and said:

Say it again?

and so I did, a couple of times, but I gave a caveat – that there might be more than one answer but at least ONE for sure that I knew was golden.

After only a little noodling she guessed water.
But we all agreed that you can kinda see water so that was out.
Then TheMommy, using the water guess as a springboard guessed the golden answer: air.

We all tested the air with our arms and decided that it was a great riddle, you can feel it but you can’t see it and we’re always touching it but you can’t grab it, our hands clutching at empty space in front of us.

The flush of cleverness and delight was still washing over the gunwales of my pride when a warning shot across the bow of my ego came in the form of TheWeeOne, crossing the room, with something important to say.

Hey Daddy!
Yeah?
I can grab it…see!

…and she proceeded to suck in a big gulp of air (big is relative mind you) and clamped her dimpled cheeks shut and…
…HELD HER BREATH!

’nuff said.

Whereupon I read the story.

This morning I read the original The Emperors New Clothes from a book of fairy tales given to LaGrande this Christmas.
Afterwards I marveled at Hans Christian Anderson’s astuteness and spent some time prattling on about where and how she/they might hear that saying in the world.

Whereupon they listen to me flap my gums

With LaGrande showing (feigning?) some interest I dove headlong into the complexities of the similes, analogies, and examples. Politics, the workplace, schools, and society (the proverbial they). Nothing was sacred.
I stressed the desire and the importance of being like the child in the story who finally says

He hasn’t anything on!

Speak the truth as you see it.

Whereupon I have the ‘truth’ spoken at me and see my future.

When I finally took a sufficient breath TheWeeOne looked up, drew a boxy shape in the air around my head and shoulders, then a long vertical line through that box, and plainly said,

PAUSE.

Then she ran off to the bathroom for a bio-break while I looked around to my support staff for an interpretation and explication of what just happened.

I supposed that she had drawn a pause sign in the air, and as a child of the OnDemand age, meant to pause me as she might Live TV.

I laughed heartily at this supposition but then she let on, when she returned, insisting that it wasn’t a pause button but rather a TV she had drawn around me with a line through it to turn it (me?) off.

If she was listening to the story of the Emperor and these swindlers, and I’m now quite clear that she was, she appears to have manufactured a Daddy-Pausing TV out of thin air.

Perhaps I should take note of when she’s matured sufficiently to fully understand the value in commodities such as this because I suspect she might try to sell that magical TV to me for a tidy sum.

I’m still here – I’ve just been INSANELY busy at the office these days.
It isn’t likely to get better anytime soon.

I have some good stuff in the hopper, mostly pictures and a video, but for now I’ll give you something to chew on…a good WeeOne quote.

Daddy…you’re getting old.
What?! Why do you say that?
‘Cause you are…’cause you have grey hairs right here, in your beard!
But…but…you know UncuhJamey has WAYYY more grey hair than I do and he isn’t as old as me, so just because I have grey hairs doesn’t mean you can say that I’m getting old, right?!

[pause]

Daddy?
Yes.
You’re getting old.

She has yet to be accused of lacking persistence.

Today – after a busy week of swimming lessons, camping, museums, zoos, and some housework with few breaks I felt like taking it easy and working on computer maintenance. TheMommy wanted to read and relax.

These are not usually short things – especially when I really haven’t done much of it for ohhhhh, about two years. What was I talkin’ bout? – Oh yeah.

So, when the girls got up and noiselessly started watching their latest Netflix infatuation I didn’t complain (like usual). Then TheMommy and I listened to Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me, did some dishes, and…TheMermaids pushed on valiantly.

There isn’t much blow-by-blow to miss here but suffice it to say…it’s now 20:22 and they watched something like 11 hours of TV – with very little interruption (except for when Netflix wanted to go outside and play once).

Un-be-liev-able.
At one point TheMommy even opened the window

Look! It’s sunny outside! Go outside and play?!
Ahhhh? [shading their eyes] It’s too bright!

What are they becoming…moles?

Then, at about 18:30 I approached them, in the dark, deep basement TV room and said

Well? was it worth it?
Worth what?
Worth “it”?! You’ve sat on your butts all day long and watched ‘Charlie’ the whole time – just think of all you’ve missed?

LaGrande just squirmed a little bit but TheWeeOne, with the surety of a seasoned philosopher said blithely

What did we miss?

Oooooh, she’s good that one.

*coming soon – activities actually DONE on my staycation. Lots of pictures.

By way of documenting the first known example of sarcastic humor in TheWeeOne, even though she didn’t mean it sarcastically, here is a good and simple one.
They were sitting in the furthest back seat in the van and LaGrande was practicing some dance movements, undulating her arm up and down.

Hey WeeOne…look…does this look like a wave?
No – It looks like an arm.

When she is 13, and hell-bent on ensuring a daily dose of pragmatism for her 16 year old sister, I expect these types of comebacks…

A lot.