Chapter Thirty Six; Pancake's Laser Eyeball

“Its Pancake . . . and she gots a laser . . . eyeeeeeeeeeee . . . baaaaaaaaallllllllll!”

I am attempting to put my seven-year-old to bed but somehow the process ends up with her singing this little made up song to me.

Pancake is her well-loved homemade rag doll, complete with button eyes and yellow yarn hair. Who apparently possesses the ability to burn you to a crisp with her vision.

I am giggling and Pancake is being hurled this way and that to the spontaneous tune. (Pancake is not only violent, she also quite the dancer.)

“The word is has," I correct her while tickling home the point. “There is no such word as gots.” (Fine with me if her doll can kick my ass but I draw the line at poor grammar in this house.)

“Details, detail,” she squeals, her typical attempt to once again sound like an adult masquerading as a first grader. My tickle attack has sabotaged that effort because she is definitely screeching like a little girl at the moment.

I cease with the torture and we get back to the business at hand: getting this kid to sleep at a reasonable hour.

Although this story starts out with a lot of laughing, it is actually all about crying.

Some people don’t believe in letting their children see them cry. I think that is a big huge stinking pile of steaming fresh cow crap.

Since when are parents supposed to be stoic super humans? If that is the case than everyone with spawn should just start saving for the therapy bill now. Because that’s a ridiculous expectation.

Being a parent is just about being a person and trying not to model glaringly idiotic behavior such as how to slam a beer or hot wire a car. Those are the basics. It’s actually not that complex. Amazingly, some people can’t meet this minimal parental criteria. (One minute of reality television is evidence of this sad fact.)

This week was a hard one for me. And I have been wearing crabby pants the whole time because of it.

But now the day has wound down and my irritation is evolving into sadness. I just felt the urge to finally cry, and oh well; my kid was in the room when it happened.

“Oh, Mommy. Are you sad?”

“Yes, I am sad,” I sniff.

“Why?”

“Just a grown up reason. I’m okay, I will be fine. Everyone gets sad sometimes. Even mommies.”

Her big blue eyes, rimmed with compassion, suddenly brighten, “Pancake can do a song to cheer you up!”

I sniff again and smile. “Okay, let’s hear Pancake’s song.”

One laser eyeball later my tears are temporarily forgotten and the antics of one wild and crazy rag doll fill the room.

And yes, my daughter saw me cry, but does that mean I’ve failed her? Somehow shaken her sense of security?

I believe the opposite is true actually.

I can’t shelter her from everything, as much as I wish I could. Someday she is going to grow up. And as much as I wish I could protect from ever having to cry at all, I know that that is not going to happen.

The only thing I can do is model the best response I can when life gets a little tough, and that certainly does not include pretending to be made of ice.

All I can do is hope that by my being honest, that in some distant future when the end of a bad day/week/year brings my grown up little girl to tears, that she remembers how her strong mother also had some days that just made her cry. And hopefully those memories will remind her that those moments don’t last forever. They are just something we must all go through in this life. The key is to just accept them when they come, and understand that only by going through them can we get to the the promise of happier days awaiting us on the other side of the sadness.

But I will admit. It is a whole lot easier to get through the tears with this kid around.

Because who can possibly cry in the presence of a silly little girl with a silly little song sany by her silly little doll she named Pancake . . .

. . . who gots a laser eyeball?

Certainly not me.