Yesterday morning, Reilly was angry at the world. One way she was expressing that anger was by not doing anything I asked her to do. In many cases, she would accentuate this by actually doing the opposite of what I asked her to do. After about an hour of mental tug-of-war, I pulled out my trump card and put her in Time Out.
After Reilly’s two minutes of Time Out, I got down on my knee, hugged her, and explained to her why she was in Time Out. She averted her eyes while I gently lectured her, even when I asked her to look at me. Thirty minutes later, she was off and running at school and I was on my way to work, frazzled.
Last night, after her bath and story time, Reilly asked that I sit in the rocking chair and sing songs to her. She wrapped her legs around my stomach, laid her head on my shoulder, and nuzzled into my neck while I started in on “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.” At the start of the second verse, she sat up and looked at me right in the eye. The intensity of her stare was almost overwhelming.
I stopped singing and asked her what was the matter. Reilly told me, a bit sheepishly, that she could sing “Twinkle, Twinkle” all by herself.
“Really?” I asked. “Well, go ahead.”
Reilly said, “One, two, three…” and then sang the song to me. After the first verse she let out a proud little giggle, and then continued until the song was over. Then we sang the song once together, a father and daughter duet that I won’t soon forget.
No comments:
Post a Comment