Firetruck

Rob took Dharma to the store the other day.  A woman there was talking to her and Dharma said, "I'm three.  But soon I'm going to be FOUR!"  The woman asked Dharma what she'd like for her birthday.  Dharma thought carefully and said, "I want a firetruck.  A BIG firetruck."

"Oh, do you want to be a fireman and put out fires when you grow up?"  she asked Dharma.

To which Dharma replied, "No.  I'm going to make fires."

Wonderful.  Fantastic.  Just super.

Egg shaped

Dharma asked me the other day, "Do eggs roll?"

I try to make her think about things so I asked her back, "They are round, aren't they?"  She turned on her attitude and said, "But circles are round and they aren't circles.  Eggs.  Are.  Ovals."

"But don't ovals look kind of round, Dharma?"

She thought about this for a second.  Let it all soak in then replied, "So an oval is just an effed up circle."

(Yes, she really said "effed up.")

Dharma and a funeral

Earlier this week my grandmother passed away.  Funerals are hard on people already, so I was not sure how a funeral accompanied by Dharma was going to go.  I have to say she did remarkably well (for her) and only caused me to hang my head in disbelief a few times.  I only had to take her outside 3 or 4 times to calm down during the wake and I only rushed her out of the viewing room twice; both times before anyone else noticed her.  I think.

When we went into the funeral home we went up to see my grandmother and Dharma whispered to me, "Is she going to say anything?"  Sigh, here we go.  "No"  I answered, "We talked about this."  Dharma nodded her head and I thought that would be the end of it.  After a while she asked me if we could go back up.  I took her and Dharma stood right there in front of the room and said "Is she STILL dead?"  I immediately took her out of the viewing room.  She ran around, got into the water fountain, explored and eventually found the food.  She was content there for a long time trying to eat her weight in blueberries.

As the night went on Dharma removed both shoes, would run when she thought I couldn't see her and walk when she knew I could and lay down in the middle of the floor.  Not too bad.  I only caught her trying to pull flowers from the arrangements once, chased her out from behind a couch once, and saw her trying to figure out how to get behind the casket once.  Again, a pretty mild night for Dharma.

The next morning was the funeral.  We talked with Dharma ahead of time about keeping quiet during the ceremony and not running around.  Which she pretty much did.  Instead of running around, she decided to climb underneath the chairs and lay there.  Then she tried to climb underneath the couch in front of us.  Since she was being quiet I decided to let it go.  As embarrassed as I was that my child was crawling around on the floor under peoples chairs, there was no use in trying to make her sit in the chair if it was only going to cause her to yell.

We got to the cemetery and the pastor was giving his last speech when Dharma decided she wanted to go sit by the casket.  So sit right down in front of it she did.  And she smelled the flowers, literally.  She leaned over and smelled the flowers on either side of her.  While she was doing this I started to step forward to get her and thought again that it may be better to let her sit there than to grab her and cause her to scream.  Then I had this thought: Dharma was holding her beloved Boo-Boo Bear.  There was a large hole behind Dharma.  I just knew Boo-Boo was some how going to end up in that hole.  I held my breath waiting and Dharma got up and went back to her seat.  Catastrophe diverted.  Somehow.

We went to eat as people normally do after a funeral.  Dharma was pretty good.  At least the people who were sitting far away from her probably thought she was pretty good.  Those of us sitting with her knew that she was cutting up her smiley face french fries into little pieces while making them beg for their lives.  In a high pitched voice, Dharma made them say, "No.  Please don't cut me up.  Help me.  Owwww."

So whatever forces were keeping Dharma tame over the last few days...Thank you.

Orange, not pink

Dharma came to me the other day out of the blue and said, "Mom, my teacher thinks my favorite color is pink."  I replied with, "Okay."

"Well, my favorite color is NOT pink.  It's orange.  Not pink."

"Okay."

"Mom, I am going to have to tell my teacher that my favorite color is not pink."

"Okay Dharma.  Just be polite about it."

"What's polite?"

I laughed and said, "Crazy you would have to ask that.  Polite is being nice.  Don't yell at her.  Just tell her nicely that your favorite color is orange.  This week."

She thought about it and said, "But it's not nice of her to think my favorite color is pink when it's orange.  Does she have to be 'plite'?"

"Dharma, her thinking your favorite color could possibly be pink is not mean.  Just be nice."

"Okay mom.  But she needs to know.  She HAS to know that my favorite color is not pink.  I don't think it's 'plite' of her to think it's pink when it's orange.  Orange, mom.  My favorite color is orange."

"This week, Dharma, yes your favorite color is orange.  But what was your favorite color last week?"

She said, "Blue."

I feel bad for the teacher.  I kind of feel like sending a note warning her of what's possibly to come.