She just needs a flower
My 4 y/o completely lost her s*&t on the cold-ass street, jellyfishing and refusing to not refuse to walk. We were about to miss pickup for my 7 y/o from his DOE school bus, which waits for no one, and I was not feeling her not feeling it– like, at all.
But then this shopkeeper stuck his head out of the flower shop, in front of which her fit was unfolding with impressively vast limbic inflection for someone only on her 1200th day of life or so. He asked, “Does she need a flower?”
The surprise cut her off from her operatic emotional outburst. Well of-fahking course she does! THAT WAS THE PROBLEM ALL ALONG! NOT ENOUGH FLORAL TONES AROUND HERE! She stared at him, too much of a yes to say yes. “Be right back!” He reassured me. My frustration was carbonated. No prob! Timely! He popped back into his expensive-as-all-high-hell flower shop. The door jangled. I could not afford these minutes, but I could not afford to not have the flower happen.
We stared. Sure enough, jangle-jangle, he came back out with a fat-petaled purple tulip and peach-pink rose, dewdrops still in formation, and handed them to her with a robust smile, and that salesman inner knowing that I would buy overpriced plants from him for the rest of my days. “Hope it works!” he winked at me.
She took them, awe creeping across her face: “My favorite clolors!”[sic]- and she sheltered them in her jacket all the way to the bus, fit interrupted, fit forgotten. “Look!” she whispered to the flowers, or to me, or to everyone. The wind *clolored* in her face a deep wounded red, but the flowers were and remained perfectly intact and undisturbed.
I could milk this experience for analogies forever, but a few things stick out:
When the emotions are too big to bear, give someone a flower.
When the emotions are too big to bear, a little act of beauty can help a whole lot.
He totally didn’t need to give her the flower.
If you want people to buy shit from you, help them through a very tough moment.
It was March and he had a sign on his shop door that mother’s day was May 14th. Plan ahead!
#parenting #emotions #beauty #protips #tantrums