A mind of her own – now I'm in trouble

My little girl is growing up. Not Molly Ringwald-in-'80s-high-school-movies growing up, but she's starting to get her own ideas, her own opinions and definitely feels empowered to make her thoughts and feelings known to one and all.

In short, it's a wonderful time, full of tantrums, pouting, frustration and tears.

And those are just my reactions.

Making the transition from toddler to full-on child with abilities and memories is a heady time for kids; they're learning what they like and don't like.

And from the looks and sounds of things these days, my daughter doesn't seem to like anything except swimming in the pool, eating candy and watching television. Well, she might, but that's what she keeps asking for.

With that in mind, my wife and I are in the midst of figuring out how to get our strong-willed daughter – the product of two stubborn and string-willed parents, of course – to see our side of things.

For instance, last weekend my daughter wanted to bring her Strawberry Shortcake book to the pool with her and read it.

Sounds like a reasonable request, until you consider that she just jumps in the pool when we go swimming and is in no way interested in sunning herself with a novel in hand, as she may well when she becomes a teenager. So the reality is that she wants to bring a book to the pool and either a) read it in the pool, thus soaking and destroying it or b) forget about it and risk Dad throwing wet towels and bathing suits on top of it in the bag we use to bring our towels and other accoutrements to the pool.

So, I said no.

She used her first tactic of negotiation, which is to collapse to the ground in tears. When that didn't work, she moved onto anger, stomping her feet and folding her arms, telling me she didn't like me and that she wanted to go swimming with Mommy. When informed that Mommy wasn't going swimming, she recanted and put on her shoes, having finally seen, apparently, that there was no way her book was coming to the pool with us, she slowly put on her shoes and picked up her book, and attempted to leave the house.

When I asked her what was in her hand, she gave me the universal 'oh, how did this get here?' shrug and put her book back on the shelf.

Busted.

I guess I shouldn't be too upset. After all, I'd much rather have a daughter who is strong-willed and questions everything than someone who just goes along to get along. That's how trouble starts for a lot of kids out there.

Footnote: Uncork the champagne bottles, because Gabrielle and I have hit a serious milestone: the little one will start her first session of preschool at the Mudpuddle in Pointe Claire.

Her first taste of preschool, and she's a legacy to boot. My sisters Emilie and Lisey were among the then-fledgling preschool's first graduates, way back in the eighties. It's nice to know that in the West Island, the more things change, the more they stay the same.