Thursday, June 19, 2008

Some Isaac and Bella things

Isaac's words keep getting more clear and useful: Help and Wait are newer staples, as are more names, and some compounds (Bye Bye Mae Mae!) He's a little singer, and loves the ABC song - he does ABCD pretty well, and the rest are more indistinct. Perhaps most oddly, he's taken to saying "Seven Eight Nine" in a row quite a bit. Not really sure where that came from, or what it could possibly mean, but he loves 7-8-9. (Perhaps he's telling the punchline to the old joke "why were 4, 5, and 6 nervous? Because 7 8 9!)

Bella has been spending the weekday mornings at UCC Bible Camp (Not UU, UCC up the block, who are plenty liberal even if they like their Jesus a bit more than the Unitarians). Tonight she's been singing a song about God Loving Us, and we can love our enemies, complete with sign language, which has been a blast to watch.

A related anecdote from earlier in the week: Up at the Grandview, Bella loved wading in the shallows of the lake, finding sea glass and rocks. A little boy around her age joined her with rolled up pants, and they seemed to be having a great time... until he spotted a big rock in her bucket and decided it would make a good SPLOSH. Bella literally lost her mind and DOVE into the water (fully dressed) to try to retrieve the rock, which was a bit further out than she could go. She was soaked from head to toe and was screaming bloody murder at this kid - you do not mess with Bella and her nature.

Tonight as I put her to bed, she confessed:

"I have a terrible image in my mind. I keep seeing that boy who took my rock and threw it, and it makes me sad and angry every time I think of him. Because I loved that rock - it was the most beautiful rock I had ever found, and I wanted to bring it home and sleep with it in my bed every night and hold it and hug it."

By the end of this story, she was wracked with sobs, and I sat with her as she calmed down. That poor sensitive girl. I tried to relate that the point of that song she kept singing was that even when someone does something bad and we think they're our enemy, that we can forgive and love them.

"I never ever want to see that boy ever again."

End of discussion.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Soon, Isaac will be able to call his grrAnn because he has the first three digits down pat. Hint.
Bella is a natural storyteller, she knows where her heart is at all times. Recommend Katherine Paterson's glorious book about reading and writing for children - THE SPYING HEART. The way the girl you loves turns you into a tree around which she can peek at the world tells me that her heart truly is engaged in the world and language - Paterson's title comes from the Japanese word for "imagination". Glad for your stories.