Pudding and Milkshakes

It's been like a mini-Christmas around here today, only the Big Event has been a playdate rather than a while-you-were-sleeping visit (it would have been impossible for Rip Van Winkle to sleep through this). Spilly's bus-buddy Sarah came to play--her first visit--and it was as though Santa himself had condescended to come by, or the Queen, as far as Spilly was concerned.

Spills began the day at 6:00 a.m. or so, planted in our doorway saying, "Mommy, did you remember something important about today?"

"Wha--?" I said. The migraine pills were only just beginning to work.

"Did you remember that Sarah was coming to play today and she was going to have a milkshake?"

"Oh, yes, yes, I did."

"Well, we'd better get up then."

"She's not coming till after lunch."

At this point, the Spills sat herself dejectedly down in the hall and said, "But I told her she could come ALL DAY."

"That's okay," I said. "By the end, it's going to feel like it was all day."

The morning was spent doing variations on, "Is it time yet?" This despite such exciting activities as cleaning the family room and joining Mommy in a vigorously delightful exercise routine. When it got to the part in the video where we were to do weights, Spills ran and got herself some pudding containers to lift up and down (Mommy used cream of mushroom soup cans). But it was only momentarily entertaining, because it wasn't Sarah. And it wasn't milkshakes.

When the climactic moment arrived, it was as though someone had shot a starter pistol and my kid had been given instructions to yell, run and hand things to people as loudly and quickly as she could. She apparently needed to live a lifetime immediately. And poor Sarah was, I believe, in shock for about the first half hour.

But she rallied, round about the time the sugar from the milkshakes hit her system. And then there were two banshees. And puppet shows. And dress-up. And dances. And a lot of pelting around saying, "Aaaaaahhhhhhh!"

Par for the course, you'd say. Except that we're shy people and so, for all her bluster, is the Spills. She's also markedly in her own little universe a lot of the time, as far as other kids are concerned (for example, her theory about how the Christmas turkey was killed is that it was hung on a wooden cross). And Sarah's lovely family has reached out to us (they took us all to a movie yesterday), and I am feeling decidedly grateful toward them for that. They are decent, intelligent, balanced, funny people, and they want my kid to be their child's friend. It warms my heart to see two girls play as crazily as these two did today.

Makes me look toward 2008 with the hope that we will have many more days like today.