"No Miraclegirl. You aren't having any!!!"
My response was exasperated. The repeat begging was wearing on my nerves.
"Mommy, I want to do the dishes. Mommy, I want to do the dishes. Mommy, I want to do the dishes!"
"Mommy, I want makeup. Mommy, I want makeup. Mommy, I want makeup!" (as she's in my makeup bag)
"Mommy, I'm helping with laundry. Mommy, I'm helping with laundry. Mommy, I'm helping with laundry!" (As clothes are sloppily hung over drying racks and folded piles of clothes are unfolded.)
"Miraclegirl. . . stop! You can not have makeup, you can not have cleaning stuff, you're getting water everywhere, paper towels cost us money quit taking all of them, you just ruined my nice pile of clothes!!!!!!"
Minutes later I look over to her toy kitchen. Tears streaming down her cheeks, she's "cleaning" her kitchen with doll clothes.
She just wants to be like you Melissa. . . That's all she's doing. . . She just wants to be like Mommy.
It was quietly shoved into my heart and mind simultaneously but it was as loud as a nuclear bomb on this, yet another, pivotal lesson-day in motherhood.
She's not deliberately trying to annoy me. She's not purposefully trying to drive me to the brink with her incessant begging. Her goal is not to frustrate me. Her chief objective is not to wear me down. It's simply to do what she sees me doing day in and day out. It's to be just like me.
Oh, but I don't want her being like me!
Not when I respond with annoyed snottiness in my voice and make her cry. How she can even possibly want to imitate me blows my mind.
I fail her so often. Like today. With a sharp voice and a hasty brush-off. So that I look over and see her quiet, no longer asking, but instead crying as she makes do with her imagination and a doll dress. Cleaning her toy kitchen sink and stove. Just like I was ten minutes earlier in my kitchen.
*gulping sob*
(this one from me)
Yet again in these short 4 years I've had, I make my way towards this precious girl of mine and ask her forgiveness. For not really seeing her heart.
The heart that just wants to be like me.
Her forgiveness comes quick, though lips are still trembling with hurt.
"It's ok Mommy. I still love you." Stated in my ear with arms around my neck and wet cheek against mine. We stand that way for a minute and then I tell her to "wait right there. I'll be back in a minute."
And that's all it takes.
A measly minute.
To grab an empty spray bottle, such as you find in the travel section of Wal*mart, fill it with water, take her some paper towels, and let her clean to her hearts content.
Because it's more than about cleaning her kitchen. It's about her being
just like me.
