True, Blue

There is an episode of Nickelodean's Blue's Room where Blue asks, "My juice is blue, what color is your juice?" For some reason this line has always stuck in my mind as the epitome of innocence. The simple discussion of juice, shared between friends. Okay, to me, it was also an indicator that my children were still young. As long as Blue was in our house, as long as songs of juice and sharing and clues swirled from the television, I could still revel in all things toddler; pretend they weren't growing up as fast as they were.

When my third child was born, instead of putting a stop-motion on time by increasing my workload and decreasing my sleep, it was as if his chubby bottom sat on the fast-forward button of our lives and suddenly a year had passed, and another.

My children are still small enough that I can protect them from most things; control what they see, hear and do. However, we're already dipping a toe in the unknowns of the world, as when my 2nd grader had his first brush with male-pattern bragging from a child this year. I'm not referring to, "My dad is tougher than your dad" bragging, no, more along the lines of locker room talk. I had thought, maybe naively, that he would not be exposed to this until much later. Sure, I talked with my son about what he'd heard, talked about the aspects that we could safely discuss and try to sweep away that which was just much too much too soon with, "We'll talk about this together one day." But it's there. You know, you can ask that it be stricken from the record, but the jury has still heard.

And then there's my daughter. She's so precious, tow-headed curls and hard-headed attitude. She'll carry a toy lizard in one hand and a doll in the the other. I want to capture her and have her stay five one extra year. Six sounds too mature, too close to the grown-up side of things. Right now, I'm enjoying her cross of baby girl and Kinder girl. The other day she was in the bathroom playing with my makeup and telling me the latest on her 'boyfriend that I'm gonna marry'. She looked so precious dabbing her cheeks with a huge, fluffy brush; covering her porcelain skin with terra cotta. It was such a grown-up behavior, boyfriend talk and makeup application. She dabbed on more color and chatted:

"I love him. I'm going to marry him. He goes everywhere I go."

Knowing her penchant for the very direct instruction of others, okay, for her ability to be bossy,I ask, "Does he do everything you tell him to do?"

She pauses, her brush mid-stroke on her cheek. "Of course not." Dab dab dab. "Sometimes I don't feel like playing with him." Dab dab. "I want to play with my friends."

She studies her work in the mirror. I ask, "What does your boyfriend do when you are off with your girlfriends?"

She stares into the mirror, chin up high as she assesses each angle of her face, dabbing color at the temple, a little on the chin. These are movements of the woman she will grow to be one day and I picture her a scientist, a CEO, confident with that toss of the head. Her answer interrupts my reflections of how this strong woman of the future will certainly make her mark on the world. "Oh? What does he do?" Dab dab dab. "He plays Monster." And with that she was five again and I could go back to knowing that I still had my babies as babies if only for a brief time. Sure, they'll just get smarter, taller and closer to the independence that we train them to seek. For now, however, I'm going to the fridge. We must have several colors of juice.