Daisy, out of the blue, told me to "Go Away." She's not quite two. Where did she hear that? So, you look at your life and start to hear all the little things you say to your wife, or the dog, or that guy who cut you off, and I'm pretty sure I didn't tell any of them to "Go Away." It's so dismissive. So regally final. She actually feels it, too; that was the rub. She looked into her brain for a phrase that would mean put me down and stop kissing my belly, and that is what her brain sent up. 'Go Away.'
And so I'm left to blame TV...well, first I blamed our friends' four-year-old girl, but then, in speaking to my wife, we couldn't be sure that Daisy hadn't been the one teaching 'Go Away' instead of learning it. So I came back to TV. But when in 'Babe' does the pig say 'Go Away'? Also, she says it with a clean American accent...so, not 'Babe'.
The real problem is, she's gonna be two.
And then 16.
She really likes me right now, despite her new phrase, but some day she's not gonna like me all that much and her brain will continue to send up "Go Away" only just her eyes will say it. And that will be fine, even mutual, perhaps, in 14 years, but for now the sting comes from the suddenness and the feeling that you only get one year of never being told to "Go Away" in her life, and that year is spent wiping her poop off her legs. Someone should have told me there was never going to be a time when she would stand on her own and walk and poop in the toilet and pick out her own clothes and never tell you to "Go Away."
On the other hand, tonight when I was reading her books before bed, she told me to "Go Away" and so I said "okay" and I got up to leave and she sat up and reached out and said "wait!"
Such a funny word, 'Wait'.
Where did she learn that?
**After writing this post, Daisy and I were watching Disney's Sword in the Stone. Remember the part where Merlin has changed Arthur in to a squirrel and then a cute red-headed squirrel falls in love with Arthur and Merlin sings about the yin and yang of life and that's how it goes and such... THEN a big purple squirrel falls in love with Merlin and she is hugging and snuggling him and Merlin pushes her off and says... "Go Away!"
Here's a link:
Merlin's Trouble.
Yup. Watching it today, Daisy said it just before Merlin did, then looked at me and smiled.
