Tuesday, March 23, 2010

The Wisdom of Children

One of the great things about being a parent is hearing all the little words and phrases kids use. And one of the things which really cracks me up is when WyoBaby says things just a little differently than most adults. For example, we don't use nail polish in our house. If you're going to give yourself a mani-pedi, you use pay nailish. And for the longest time, we caught calepittars and put them in jars, hoping they would disappear into cocoons and emerge as flutterbys. We're big fans of mazagines, because there are so many interesting articles to read. Sadly, WyoBaby is outgrowing many of these words. But the other day we were in Walmart (good grief, I spend some time in that dang place!) when WyoBaby turned to me and asked, "Mom, can you feel my glads? I think I'm getting a cold, and I'm pretty sure my glads are swollen." Of course I replied by feeling her little neck glands and saying, "Nope, your glads feel okay to me, Baby." And then two days later, she said it again, "Mom, I'm pretty sure I'm getting a cold because my glads feel really swollen, can you check?" Still no swollen glads.

Last week I was getting on her case because she'd left a trail of crumbs from the kitchen all the way to the living room. As I was telling her to go get the vacuum, she said, "Jeez, I guess I'm like Handsome Gretel, huh?" At first, I wasn't sure I'd heard her correctly, so I asked her to repeat herself. "I left a little trail of crumbs through the house, just like those two kids, Handsome Gretel, did. Remember?" Ah yes. Handsome Gretel. Who could forget?

But the one which really got me this weekend didn't come from WyoBaby. It was uttered by the little neighbor girl. It wasn't that she mispronounced a word; rather, it was the way she said what she did. I was on the computer, and the kids were playing the Wii. I could tell because the one not playing was yelling instructions at the two who were. Don't you just hate that? It's like the person who looks over your shoulder when you're playing Solitaire, "Move the red queen onto the black king! Oh, black 7 onto red 8!!" Like you didn't see those moves...drives me crazy. Anyway, the three kids were making a lot of noise, and yelling at each other and the game, when all of a sudden, the little neighbor girl announced, "That's it. I'm using The Force." Yes, they were playing the Lego Star Wars game, so I know to what she was referring, but the tone she used got me thinking. I want to be able to say, in a matter-of-fact way, "That's it. I'm using The Force," and be able to back it up.

Do you have any idea how invaluable a tool that would be to me, both as a wife and mother? The possibilities are endless. "Baby, I have asked you TEN TIMES to clean up your room, but it's still a disaster. You leave me no choice; I'm going to have to use The Force. You will clean your room." To which she would respond, "I will clean my room." Oh, and when I want J to take me on a date? "You want to take me to dinner and a movie." And I would act completely surprised when he said, "I want to take you to dinner and a movie."

I'm on to something, people. Any ideas how I can make this work? I haven't seen Yoda in ages, so I'm not sure of his current address. If any mothers out there have enough midichlorians in their system to use The Force, I could really use some pointers. If you need to Google midichlorians, you can't help me. Sorry.

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