» Tuesday, 8 April A.D. 2008
hugs from ally
We drove to see my grandmother this past Saturday. While we know she loves to see us, doing so makes for a long day--about eight hours on the road. Sometimes the girls sleep in the car, sometimes they don't. Today was one of the days where they--especially Ally--choose not to, and it made for a bit of a long day. Tricia did a great job entertaining the girls in the backseat of the car today: singing with them, reading with them, reasoning with a tired 2.5-year old about singing songs and not playing with her sister's sunshade while her sister was sleeping for ever-so-briefly, etc.
Saturdays are bath nights in the Froyd household. Despite getting home late and thinking it would not be a good time to attempt a bath, Tricia suggested filling up the tub for Becca just a little bit and letting her splash around before going to bed. I did this and Becca climbed in and began cheerfully pouring water back and forth between containers. Tricia went to get Ally ready for bed and I stepped out to get a glass of water.
When I came back into the bathroom, Tricia was standing there with Ally in her PJs. Before I explain what happened next, y'all ought to know that I am not Ally's favorite parent. Tricia insists that this is only because I don't have breasts and therefore don't provide the “mommy milk,” but I sometimes suspect it goes deeper than that. Every once in a while, however, Ally does something that indicates she does appreciate having her father around. Tonight provided just such an occasion.
I walked up to Tricia and began talking to Ally a little bit. Ally unwrapped herself from Tricia and leaned forward: this is her way of indicating that she's willing to be passed off. Usually I need to hold my hands out to her before she will lean forward. But hey, I'll take whatever daughter adoration I can get, so I held out my hands and held her upright against me with one arm.
Ally then laid her head down on my shoulder, which is out of character for her, especially when Mommy is around. She usually has this “up-periscope” sort of posture that is focused on ascertaining Mommy's location and distance to Mommy. If she is within range and it does not appear that Mommy is making a move in her direction, she activates her Mommy Proximity Alarm (MPA) to indicate her displeasure with this state of affairs. Again, I'll take whatever daughter adoration I can get.
What happened next, though, totally surprised me. She popped up, looked at me, and reached her hand up to stroke the side of my face. She then leaned in and gave me a kiss right on my mouth! She has “given kisses” before, but that involved her leaning her head forward until her forehead made contact with some part of your face; this was much different. It didn't seem accidental, but very deliberate, especially because we think the head-on-shoulder bit was “hugging” me and we talking about Becca and Daddy giving Mommy and Ally hugs and kisses before Ally gets put down for bed each night.
Tricia and I started laughing and I had a few tears sliding down my check from this unexpected outpouring of affection from my daughter. I think we must have freaked Ally out somehow, because she was ready--not upset, just ready--to go back to the safety of Mommy shortly thereafter. And she refused to do any sort of repeat performance before Tricia had to put her to bed. Hopefully we didn't indicate that this was undesired behavior. Her little gestures totally made my day.
posted by Nate @ 12:40AM