Curious Ayla

Alicia went straight to yoga from work today, which meant I had Ayla from daycare pickup time (3:30) to bedtime (7:30). She heard me say the word ‘library’ in the car on the way home (why would I even say that word?) so then we had to go to there. There was really no discussion, as she even knows which highway exit goes toward home, and starts screaming ‘no hooome!’. There’s no way of explaining to her that the same exit also takes us to the library, so she’s pretty much inconsolable until we pass the turn for our street.

In the children’s room, we played for a while and then switched over to browsing for books. Ayla was pretty thrilled to find out that Curious George is available in print; she probably thinks the books are based on the TV show. Flipping open one of George’s adventures, she accidentally tore a page, and then on-purposely tore it some more until it came right out. I hesitated for a moment, not really sure what to do. My first instinct was to tell her never to do that, and then hide the page in my pocket. I mean, who knows what terrible consequences might follow for destroying library property?

Then I decided to make it a teaching moment, and dragged her up to the librarian’s counter to confess. Once there, I tried to make her say ‘Excuse me, I’m sorry but I accidentally tore this book’. But instead she just looked like she was about to collapse in a puddle of tears, her lower lip quivering and her eyes all watery. So I said it myself, “Excuse me, but my daughter accidentally tore this book.” And the librarian was all like, whatever. He didn’t care at all. I’m not sure he even bothered to tape the page back in. The kids can just watch the show to see what they missed.

I hoped it would be a good lesson for Ayla, but she was nonplussed, and moved right on to mashing a computer keyboard and pressing every button on the housing until the thing shut itself off, exasperated. Fortunately there was no permanent damage, which is good, because I don’t think I could’ve fit the whole thing in my pocket.