Forty-Seven Months

Dear Persephone,

You are forty-seven months old today. A few weeks ago I mentioned to you that I was writing these letters, and you were intrigued. What are they about, you wanted to know. I told you that, in part, I try to record some of the things that you’re doing so that you’ll be able to know about them years after you’ve forgotten. You started listing some of the things that you do, so I wrote them down. The rest of this letter was composed by you, with very little prompting on my part. I merely transcribed your words.

• Swimming.
• Watching TV called the Wiggles. Watching cartoons
• Helping Mama make pancakes.
• Helping Dada bake bread.
• Cutting scissors at school.
• Drinking.
• Do work at school with pretty colored markers, and they don’t have any brown, and they don’t have any gray, and gray is your favorite color right?
• Praying at school.
• Helping Mama and Dada going to the grocery
• Take colored baths with those little fuzzy tablets.
• Pretend I’m sailing in the bathtub.
• Going to ballet class.
• Go to a ride at the mall.
• Riding in the car with Mama and Dada.
• Smacking the washcloth. I’m giving it a spanking. The washcloth is being bad, Daddy. He doesn’t know it’s bath time.
• Washing my hair without soap.
• Praying to Jesus and to baby Jesus. We even got a colorful statue of him at school.
• Make projects — letter people projects on paper that have already been lined.
• Praying to Mother Earth.
• And one day I saw Dada get his hair cut. I just peeked my head in. No one saw me but you Dada.
• Coloring Brigid.
• Watching TV called Dora.
• Taking a snowflake bath one in my sparkling purple seltzer water. The snowflake made that.
• Sleeping with Quiet Bunny.
• I don’t want to put anything about Lala and Lily.
• Always I say why, why, why. I don’t know why. Ha ha. See, I’m saying why now.
• My favorite letter is P. I don’t know why I’m saying why.
• I’m making up my own recitals, Dada. Some people even make fun of my recitals. I’m pretending you make fun of my recitals.

Postscript: For more daughter-authored content, see the Tea Party video.