Cami: I’m going to magic you. Zim!
Me: But nothing has happened.
Cami: It’s just pretend.
Me: Can you do some real magic?
Cami: I’m doing pretend magic. Yes, something needs to happen.
Me: Do some real magic then.
Cami: Magic you. Magic you. Turn Daddy into a little fairy. Zim!
Me: Oh.
Cami: No, that’s not right. Magic you. Magic you. Zim! Turn Daddy into a fairy pirate!
Me: That’s more like it.
A mother showed me her daughter’s folded paper version of an age-old game and asked whether I had seen it before. She had made them herself, while growing up as a girl in Shanghai. A Fortune Teller, Whirlybird, or Cootie Catcher in the United States (for catching cooties) and a Chatterbox in Australia, the game has a long history. I hadn’t seen one for a while, but according to the book, Studying Girl Culture: A Reader’s Guide, girls in Japan were first observed playing this simple playground pastime as early as the 1600s. Social trends come and go, amazingly though, this simple one remains. It moved from the East to the West from generation to generation of young girls and in Melbourne 2013, the game is still alive and well.
Charlie: Mum? You know puppy school? Well, there is a big dog
there who teaches all the puppies to be dogs.
Mum: Charlie, I think it’s a person who teaches the puppies.
Charlie: Mum, that’s crazy. Dogs don’t teach babies how to be people…
Can’t really fault the logic.
Dog drawing: Matt Davidson
A conversation with a 5-year-old.
Me: What’s going to be the best thing about Easter?
Issy: Ghosts.
Me: Ghosts? What do you mean ghosts?
Issy: Ghosts. Dressing up as a ghost.
Me: Isn’t that for Halloween?
Issy: No, I mean Easter ghosts.
Me: I’ve never heard of them.
Issy: They eat bunnies.
Scents and Nonsensibilty:
A three-year-old reveals her acute olfactory dysfunction
Camille: Your head smells like orange juice.
Me: Really? What does my chin smell like?
Camille: Lemon squeezy.
Me: What about my eye?
Camille: Sniff, sniff. Bananas! I smell your other eye, it smells like ham.
Me: And what about …
Camille: I smell your ear now … sniff, sniff, sniff. Ha! Chocolate!
Isadora: Are there pirates in the Philippines?
Me: Yes, and other places … on the high seas. How can you spot if
someone is a pirate?
Isadora: They have a scratch on their face and wood leg.
Me: What do pirates do?
Isadora: They do three things.
Me: Three?
Isadora: They steal boats. Steal treasure. And chase people.
Me: Would you like to meet a pirate?
Isadora: No. I want to watch them on TV, when I’m 6 or 7.
My best four year old friend (BFYOF) and I were reading The Perfect Monster by Sally Grindley and Erica-Jane Waters when the coversation turned to the nature of reality, epistemology, exceptionalism, popcorn and Tinkerbell dresses.
Me: Do you think the characters are real?
BFYOF: Ummm, yes!
Me: What makes them real? Are they pretend or are they real?
BFYOF: They’re real. Cos, they’re just in the country but the book seems like they’re not real but they’re actually real.
Me: They’re real but they’re not real in the book?
BFYOF: Yes!
Me: OK, hmmm, so how does that work?
BFYOF: Ummm…?
Me: So on the page they’re not real?
BFYOF: Yes because they are real but they just don’t show they’re real.
Me: OK, so … they could walk into the room here?
BFYOF: No!
Me: No?
BFYOF: Because they’re very very very long to their, to their country. It’s very very long.
Me: Aahh. They have their own country?
BFYOF: Yeah! And they don’t come to people’s houses because they don’t know where to go.
Me: OK, and the country they live in is far away.
BFYOF: Yes! Very far away. I think they’re …up (she points vaguely to the sky).
Me: Up in the sky?
BFYOF: Yes, there’s a big man up there who says Bing! Bang! Fo! Fum!
Me: I smell the blood of an Englishman!
BFYOF: …(she looks quizzical…)
Me: Is that how it goes? Well that’s interesting. I didn’t realise the monsters had another country.
BFYOF: Yeah? You didn’t know that?
Me: No, I didn’t know that.
BFYOF: Do you know why I know everything?
Me: Why do you know everything?
BFYOF: Because sometimes my brain just knows everything and it tells me…yeah.
Me: Wow!
BFYOF: Yeah everyday.
Me: You’re lucky! Does that work for everyone? Does everyone’s brain tell them stuff?
BFYOF: No, just me because I’m a special girl.
Me: You’re a special girl?
BFYOF: (whispers in my ear): Because I eat popcorn!
Me: Popcorn? Does that make you special or does that give you special powers?
BFYOF: That gives me special!
Me: Special powers?
BFYOF: No, not special powers. It just makes me special. Want me to wear the Tinkerbell dress?
Me: No, I like what you’re wearing.
BFYOF: OK.
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CONVERSATION WITH A TWO-YEAR-OLD
Camille: I don’t like girls or boys.
Me: Why not?
Camille: I don’t like boys. I spit them out.
Me: Who do you like?
Camille: I like … umm … my sister!
Me: Your sister is a girl. So you do like girls?
Camille: I love girls!!
Me: But, do you like girls?
Camille: I don’t like girls.
rs
CONVERSATION WITH A TWO-YEAR-OLD
Camille: We live in India
Me: No we don’t. We live in Australia.
Camille: No Dad. We live in India.
Me: Sorry sweetie, but we don’t. We live in Australia, not India.
Camille: Oohhh! Pfffft!
CONVERSATION WITH A FOUR-YEAR-OLD
Isadora: Do spiders cuddle?
Me: Maybe. They’ve got plenty of legs to wrap around each other.
Isadora: What do crocodiles eat?
Me: What do you think they eat?
Isadora: Blueberries
Me: What about lions, what do they eat?
Isadora: Lions eat lions … what about butterflies?
Me: What about them?
Isadora: Do butterflies have bottoms?
Me: Good question, I guess they do.
Isadora: I want to eat butterfly bottoms.
Me: Umm. What about dogs, what do they eat?
Isadora: Breakfast.
bakersmith 