December 10th, 2009
Why my daughter may be hazardous to my eyesight
Julia and I were in the bathroom a couple of nights ago, she in the shower, me pressed up against the mirror plucking my eyebrows, when out of nowhere she says,
“Mummy, are you and Daddy getting separated?”
I nearly tweezed my eyeball right out my head, y’all.
“What?” I didn't even try to keep the shrill out of my voice.
From behind the shower curtain, the same question: “Are you and Daddy getting separated?”
Oh shit, I thought. Did she overhear us arguing? Did she hear somebody say something?
“Uh, no, I mean, um, no…” I stammered. “Why would you ask me a thing like that? Did you hear someone talking about that?”
“No,” I heard her say.
“Did someone at school talk to you about their parents separating?” Maybe one of her friends’ parents is splitting up, I thought.
“Nooooooo, Mom,” she drawled, her voice laced with exasperation. “We’re learning about all the different kinds of families at school.”
I breathed a quiet sigh of relief. “Oh, okay,” I said, relaxing against the counter. “And to answer your question, sweetie, no, your father and I aren’t separating,” and when she poked her head out from behind the shower curtain, I made a face at her and stuck my tongue out.
Most of the kids in her class live in a house with their parents, she said. I told her that when I was her age, my parents were separated – divorced, eventually – which she knew, but didn’t fully comprehend, I don’t think, until that point.
“They were?” She sounded almost incredulous.
“Yup,” I said. “I lived with Gramma, and saw Papa on weekends,” I explained.
“Ooooohhh,” she said slowly – I could hear the wheels turning in her head – “they were separated…”
She was quiet after that, and I turned back toward the mirror and peered at my eyebrow. And then, from behind the shower curtain:
“Who left who?”
And for the second time that evening, I nearly removed my eyeball with my tweezers. I mean, I tell my six-year-old daughter that my parent separated when I was a little girl and she asks me who left who?! GOOD GOD. Couldn’t she have just asked me how the baby gets in the Mummy’s tummy instead?
