Dessie's sister, Ashley, came to town for a week with her 5-year-old daughter, Olivia. I was meeting both for the first time, and Dessie and her three youngest kids were seeing them for the first time since the time they spent visiting Ohio last summer.
Waking up from a nap when we got to where they would be staying for the week, Olivia was shy with everyone right at first. Our little girl of 8 exhibited a nostalgic, almost parental relationship with her cousin, two years her junior. Olivia's the cutest little thing, and her face is a miniature replica of her mom's. Within minutes, she was revived and animated, laughing with the girls, chasing and being chased from the sun deck to the house. We adults kept to our own group, shielding our eyes and allowing that behavior to continue for a little while. Ashley became the first to get sick of the running around, showing the first sign of an impatience I would recognize often over her seven-day stay in our area.
The seven of us got some grub and went bowling. After we selected our bowling balls and rental shoes (after which we noticed barely anybody rents shoes anymore -- what's up with that???), the next step was to enter our names onto the electronic scoring machine. We were paying for only one hour of bowling, the first five minutes of which consisted exclusively of typing in four kids' aliases, names like "Captain Vengeful" and "Stretchmark." (Not those exactly, but wouldn't they be cool names for next time?)
It was in the cumbersome process of doing this that we recognized how difficult it is to type with that junky keypad -- overly sensitive one moment and virtually unresponsive the next. Names as long as "Layla" and "Steve" would have taken another full minute each to type in, so I suggested we just go with the short and sweet "R" for her, and I would be "W." Just random letters that purposely didn't coincide with our own names, yet neither signifying anything either.
Once Olivia got through the awkward not-knowing-who-I-am phase of a little while, she came out of her shell toward me. Forgetting the name under which I had been introduced to her only once hours earlier, she instead called me "W" because, after all, that's what the screen says my name is, doesn't it? Cute! No need to correct her. She added the "Mr." later on, out of courtesy, and the name stuck through the rest of our action-filled weekend and the rest of the week she and Ashley were around.
The very first time Olivia called me that, I couldn't help but think I had made a mistake in choosing a good one-letter name for myself: too reminiscent of an awful president who just left office. But I don't regret the name. Olivia's 5 now, and that's probably one of those things she'll never forget every time she talks to me in the future, and she'll never let me forget it either. It's painfully cute when Olivia says it. That, and her Aunt Dessie is sometimes "Mrs. R," which is equally cute. They're names I made up!
One absolutely wonderful thing about Olivia (a.k.a. "Fuzzball" or "Snowflake") is that she's still in a young and pure stage of life when she still trusts human beings. That disintegrates eventually, tarnished usually first by parents' well-meaning lessons about talking with strangers, and compounded by experiences with thieving schoolmates, jilted lovers, oblivious drivers, uncaring bosses, soulless corporations, unhelpful customer service, elevator music, corrupt governors and the like. Back when you're unaffected by any of that, you have such an inherent sense of well-being with everyone you meet. Olivia is still the sunshine girl riding in the shopping cart at the grocery store who smiles and waves hi, effectively melting the hearts of virtually everyone around.
Except for those responsible for elevator music -- they're just plain evil.
Dessie reminds me it's too late in her kids' lives to feel that way and have such an affinity toward me. That, and I'm fighting the additional uphill battle of being a stepdude to three little kids who still don't know why their mom wants to be with anyone other than their dad. I know it's tough, but there's a long-term award ahead. Keep your eyes on the prize!
No comments:
Post a Comment
Comments are moderated prior to publication. Comments will not be published if they are deemed vulgar, defamatory or otherwise objectionable.