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April 4, 2004
Ella’s skittishness has found a new phobia, and I’m pretty worried about how this one might develop. The other day Jamie and I were upstairs when all of a sudden we heard a piercing screech followed by hysterical crying downstairs. Fearing the worse (although thinking it was curious that I hadn’t heard any corresponding THUMP) I raced down stairs and found Ella bawling in the middle of the living room. I scooped her up and immediately began to examine her but could find nothing. She was too hysterical to tell me what was the matter for quite some time but eventually we figured out that she had seen some ants in the living room. Sure enough, the spring time thaw had brought our annual unwelcome visitors, and looking around I saw about 5-10 of the tiniest little ants.
What can you do? These ants come out every year despite our best efforts, so I couldn’t just get rid of them, and I knew they could be popping up here and there in the future. We sat her down and talked with her about how the ants can’t hurt her, they are too small and don’t want to hurt her anyway. Jamie (the sweetie) scooped up an ant and we watched it run around a piece of paper and then he let it run all over his hand. Finally, we decided we would keep one as a pet and put it into an old Mayonnaise jar. By now Ella was feeling more confident, a little braver, and even named him Scanty. Poor Scanty didn’t survive the night, and was thrown away in the morning along with the now nastified mayonnaise jar.
Since this day last week it is very obvious the ants are on her mind. She frequently brings them up, with myself and with strangers “I saw ants.” Every morning as we head downstairs she is always asking me if the ants will still be there (only a very few since that first day). And often I will catch her carefully scanning the living room floor before she walks into it. I’ve been trying to be very casual and not make a big deal about it, boldly striding into the living room ahead of her. But later in season we also get these Boxelder bugs which are considerably larger, although just as harmless. Without wanting to scare her, I’ve tried to casually mention that there may be more bugs but none of them are bad and they all just mean it’s spring and summer time.
Is this cute or disturbing?
Lately we (Jamie, Ella and I) have been having a lot of fun playing under the covers of our bed. It’s a fun way to start the morning yet still milk a few minutes out of that still warm mattress. It’s a little hot in our little cave but delightfully cozy. We do a number of things down there. Often, we will sit and listen for noises and periodically Ella will scream and say she hears a noise—a tiger, a ghost, an owl or a Bigbro (don’t know what the last one is but she tells me it roars like a tiger and eats people). We quiver at the noises and then Ella shushes the auditory animals away and the whole game starts over. Other times we will all take a nap down there, and Ella pulls the blackest tight over her head and makes these adorable fake snoring sounds. Too cute.
The cutest thing, though, is to tell stories. I admit after reading one of Jeanette’s entries about her story telling I started to notice that all the stories Ella and I shared were from books and determined to start telling stories from imagination as well. So when we do this under the covers we go back and forth telling each other stories, first me and then her, and the other person gets to decide what the story they are told will be about (does this make sense?) both the type of animal (bear, worm, bird) and it’s name (I choose boring ones like Bob or Fred but Ella prefers these crazy Asian sounding names like Jen-Shay, or Put-ray or Chinchi.) Sometimes, if she can’t think of a story she just busts out in these songs like :”Fred the Elephant, Fred the Elephant, FRED THE ELEPHANT! That’s how it goes, Mommy” but sometimes she is quite creative, like this next one I will relate
“Once there was a white butterfly named Jack and he flew and he flew and he wasn’t hungry so he didn’t want a snack (this is a departure from most of her stories, which involve the characters eating). And then he saw his friend and his friend was a SHARK. And he said “How are you” “I am sad” the shark replied and he was CWYING (a lot of her stories involved characters crying, and she always says this part in a high pitched weepy voice) “Why are you cwying?” Said the Butterfly. “I am so sad because my brothers, they are my fwends, and they said……….. DAMMIT!!!!”
And that was the end of the story. When I first heard it I just thought it was funny and mentally thought that Jamie and I really have to watch our mouths around her. Later though, thinking about it, I remembered a time that we were arguing and I know that phase was shouted out and now I am thinking that the whole experience probably scared her and she was processing it in her mind and that’s how it came out in the story. Needless to say, I have felt very guilty ever since but still have to admit that I don’t think Jamie and I do enough to shield her from our arguments (and this has been a tough week, with a flooded basement and a lot of lost sleep so we have been pretty short with each other lately). It’s hard to just turn on and off like that, based on whether the time is okay to speak freely.
Ants part II
Well, it’s now been a week since I wrote the above section about the ants and I guess our bug loving efforts have paid off because Ella has now swung in the opposite direction regarding her affections towards the ants (which there are a lot less of, I am happy about). Now all the ants are her friends, all named Scanty. First thing in the morning she heads out to search for Scanty and say Good Morning to him. Periodically through the day she will check for Scanty or talk to him “Good bye Scanty, I’m going upstairs now” “Scanty, do you want to see my picture?”
I don’t know what to think anymore…
Bonnie’s Book Reviews—
The Vision of Emma Blau—This is by the same author who wrote Tales from The River, which I did enjoy, thought it was beautifully written but was very very slow. This book was almost exactly the same, pretty but S-L-O-W. In fact, not much ever really happened. I also didn’t like it since it was one of those books that follows a family through multiple generations which is interesting but you never get really close to any of the characters, which frustrates me. Actually, my favorite thing about this book was that the audiotape was read by the author, who is German, and I enjoyed hearing her accent, especially since the book is about a German family in America.
The Other Side of the River—A true story outlining the facts around a boy found floating in a river between two very racially charged towns. Very sad, no answers, but nothing new or particularly insightful in my opinion.
As always, thanks for reading.
Bonnie
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