A One-Person Play, Starring Annie

Annie's imaginative role-play took her in two different directions today: playing Mommy, and playing Daddy. Here's how it went . . .

As Mommy:

It started when I was in the shower, Jemma was taking her morning nap, and Annie was playing contentedly with Gracie. She came into the bathroom, saying she needed a Kleenex. She's been a little sniffly lately, so I told her to help herself and thought nothing of it. After I was out of the shower, I heard her talking to Gracie from her bedroom.

"Oh, Gracie, honey, OK, just a minute, I know, I know, you're so hungry. Do you want some milk? OK, just a minute, sweetie . . . " I peeked around the corner and saw Annie cradling Gracie while trying to haul her pink chair out of her room. She plunked it down, loudly, in the hallway, and proceeded to sit on it, cover her shoulder with a baby blanket, and feed Gracie. No bottle involved, if you know what I mean.

Now this is nothing new; she's been pretending to nurse her babies ever since Jemma came along. So I smiled, got myself dressed, and then went to dress Annie for the day. Which is when I found the Kleenex, wadded up into a ball and stuffed under her little Gap PJ top, right around the booby area.

"What's this?" I ask.

"That's my pointy thing, for feeding Gracie from my tummy. I need another Kleenex so I can have two of them, like you. Mommy, where are my pointy things?"

(Oh, dear God, the anatomy lessons will never stop, will they?)

Other ways of role-playing Mommy included stomping down the hallway (and, on reflection, I actually do this when I'm bringing Annie to her room for a time-out) and telling me, "I'm giving Gracie a time-out for being rough with Jemma!," taking her shopping cart to go get groceries, putting on lotion, and, of course, going to a concert. It was a busy morning until Jemma got up and we braved the rain to go to the mall. Then, after dinner . . .

As Daddy:

Announced, "I need to go to work. I need you to iron my tie." Then proceeded to have me tie an old ribbon around her neck, put on giant brown dress shoes, drink some coffee from her kitchen coffeemaker, get a bag to carry plus her play doctor kit, and get on her car to go to work. She informed me that she drives a red car, "like Miss Heidi."

"Give me a hug and kiss! I'm going to work! Be good today! See you at dinner!" - all yelled breezily from her car as she was rolling away. Her "office" was in the dining room; "Don't come in here! I'm working!"

Minutes later, she arrived home, apparently weary, and announced that she was going to bed. She took her "tie" off, hung it on our bedroom doorknob, put Jason's shoes back in the closet, and climbed up into our bed, where she merrily pretended to read "Eat, Pray, Love" until Jason really did get home from work.

I love things like this on two levels. One, it really is hilarious to me to see what Annie picks up from both her parents and then get to observe her acting it out in her kid-size fantasy world. Two, I like to think that she's growing up with the idea that she could be happy playing either one of these roles - or both of them - in her real, grown-up future. Maybe she'll nurse her own babies, take them grocery shopping, give time-outs, cook, clean, and generally make a life for herself at home. Or, maybe she'll march out into the working world with a briefcase, medical kit, or tap shoes. And maybe she'll find a way to do a little of both and be happy in all her roles.