At my daughter\u2019s third birthday pool party, she pointed at my stepmom\u2019s stomach and said, \u201cDaddy\u2019s in there\u201d \u2014 I laughed until I saw WHAT she was actually pointing at.<\/p>\n
At my daughter\u2019s third birthday pool party, she pointed at my stepmom\u2019s stomach and said, \u201cDaddy\u2019s in there\u201d \u2014 I laughed until I saw WHAT she was actually pointing at.<\/p>\n
For my daughter Ariel\u2019s third birthday, my husband, Glen, and I decided to keep things simple and celebrate at home with a family pool party.<\/p>\n
Her preschool friends came over, along with pretty much our entire family. The backyard filled up fast\u2014kids splashing in the pool, adults talking around the food table, people moving between the water and the lawn chairs.<\/p>\n
Even my stepmom, Clara, showed up.<\/p>\n
That surprised me more than I wanted to admit.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Clara had married my father fifteen years earlier, back when I was still a rebellious teenager, and she had NEVER liked me. I couldn\u2019t point to one terrible thing I\u2019d done to her. We simply never became close, and after enough awkward years, avoiding each other became easier than pretending otherwise.<\/p>\n
Still, this was Ariel\u2019s birthday. When Clara arrived, I was genuinely glad she\u2019d made the effort.<\/p>\n
And for a while, everything was great.<\/p>\n
The kids swam. Everyone ate. Ariel raced around with her friends like she had enough energy for the entire backyard.<\/p>\n
Then Clara climbed out of the pool wearing a beautiful ONE-PIECE swimsuit.<\/p>\n
At almost the exact same moment, Ariel came running past with a group of kids headed for ice cream.<\/p>\n
She stopped.<\/p>\n
She stared at Clara.<\/p>\n
Then she pointed straight at CLARA\u2019S STOMACH and shouted loudly enough for nearly everyone nearby to hear:<\/p>\n
\u201cMommy, Daddy\u2019s in there!\u201d<\/p>\n
People burst out laughing.<\/p>\n
I did too.<\/p>\n
For about two seconds, I figured this was just one of those completely bizarre things a three-year-old says\u2014the kind of sentence that turns into a family joke for the next ten years.<\/p>\n
Then the embarrassment hit me.<\/p>\n
I hurried over, gently lowered Ariel\u2019s pointing hand, and told her it wasn\u2019t polite to point at someone\u2019s stomach.<\/p>\n
\u201cCome on, sweetheart,\u201d I said, trying to guide her back toward the other kids.<\/p>\n
But Ariel planted her feet.<\/p>\n
Her little face tightened.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut DADDY\u2019S IN THERE! You have to save him!\u201d<\/p>\n
A few people laughed again, but this time the laughter sounded confused.<\/p>\n
Glen was standing nearby, watching the whole thing with a helpless shrug.<\/p>\n
I pointed directly at him.<\/p>\n
\u201cSweetheart, Daddy is standing right here. See?\u201d<\/p>\n
Ariel looked at Glen.<\/p>\n
Then she looked back at Clara.<\/p>\n
And suddenly, she started CRYING.<\/p>\n
Not the dramatic crying she sometimes did when she wanted another scoop of ice cream. This was different. She looked genuinely frightened and frustrated, and that was the moment the whole thing stopped feeling funny.<\/p>\n
\u201cDaddy\u2019s on her stomach!\u201d she kept insisting.<\/p>\n
I crouched beside her and tried to calm her down, but Ariel wouldn\u2019t let it go.<\/p>\n
Clara rolled her eyes.<\/p>\n
She muttered that Ariel was talking nonsense, walked over to her lounge chair, and lay down as though the whole thing wasn\u2019t worth another second of her attention.<\/p>\n
I stayed beside Ariel, trying to understand what she thought she had seen.<\/p>\n
Then she grabbed my hand.<\/p>\n
Her small fingers locked around mine, and before I could stop her, Ariel pulled me across the poolside toward Clara\u2019s lounge chair.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
At my daughter\u2019s third birthday pool party, she pointed at my stepmom\u2019s stomach and said, \u201cDaddy\u2019s in there\u201d \u2014 I laughed until I saw WHAT she was actually pointing at. … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37284,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40344","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-family","category-inspiration","category-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/readingdairy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40344","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/readingdairy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/readingdairy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/readingdairy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/readingdairy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=40344"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/readingdairy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40344\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40346,"href":"https:\/\/readingdairy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40344\/revisions\/40346"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/readingdairy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/37284"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/readingdairy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=40344"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/readingdairy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=40344"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/readingdairy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=40344"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}