Childhood Surprises

I… had to stop watching about half-way through. I'll probably watch the whole thing later with Milady and Daughter. The girl's crying was just too much.

When our daughter was about that age, we were walking through the windy city, and daughter asked where mom had gone (around a corner momentarily). I joked that the wind had carried here up by the Sears tower. Error! The resulting look of absolute anguish on daughter's face still haunts me. Little ones at a certain age cannot discern jokes like that, or sarcastic retorts (which I see parents using so often). Subsequent explanation does not assuage the trauma, either.

So here's this girl, her Daddy's gone a long time; perhaps she has some inkling that some daddies with his job don't come back. Suddenly, unannounced, he's there. Thrill. Terror. Relief. Just altogether overwhelming. "Is this real?"

As a kid, I never was big on surprises, as a general rule. Even good ones (mine usually weren't) can make you feel tricked or something like that. Anyway, I deeply sympathized with the little girl.

Not that we haven't seen hearty high school football players weeping almost as openly upon soldier dad's return!