Year of Writing 58 What goes on in there?

2/28/12

Sometimes we forget that our children, especially when young, are burgeoning individuals with their own ideas, trajectories, and emotions.  We forget that they are not just mockingbirds, and when we are reminded of this it is profound. 

It was nothing huge.  Isla was just sitting in the bathtub, waiting for our ridiculously slow faucet to fill the space around her with warm water.  It was the way she was sitting that made me pause, however.  Knees drawn up to her chest, head down.  "Are you OK, sweetie?"  I asked.
"Yeah, daddy." she said, not looking up.    "just..." 
"just what?"    At this point I get a little worried.  Do three-year-old kids get depressed?  Where was my boisterous superball of a child? 
"just, could you sit in here with me for a little while?"
So I did, perched on the toilet seat, unable to think of anything appropriate to say.  Truthfully, the silence felt right, so I left it so.  She sat like that for a couple of minutes, maybe four or five, then looked up finally, and said "thank you dad."  all grown-up like, then: "what game should we play... you be Harry Potter and I'll be Isla, but you think I'm Hermione and I'm trapped in a pool with evil mermaids." 

AND we're back to the reality I'm used to and comfortable with. 

But during those minutes of silence, she was completely herself - I wonder if she needed or wanted me in the room to feel safe in her own head, or if it was just a long, long imagination session winding up to her next game.  I'll never know, and that's what's so cool.  That's what's so profound.