"In this case..."

I love Maya. Of course I do, I'm her father after all. But I love being with Maya. I love seeing life through her eyes. She is really an incredible person to be around.

As her father, I guess I see part of my job is sort of her tour guide to life. When she asks me a question, I try to give her a complete and honest answer. I try to not only answer her specific question at the time, but also provide other examples how my answer to her question might be applied to other areas of life. And in doing this, I guess I tend to use the phrase, "In this case..." when I try to summarize or reel back my answer to her specific question. I guess I use this phrase often.

A few weeks back she asked me some question....I don't remember now what that question was, but I guess I used my "In this case..." phrase because she asked me why I always say, "In this case...." So I had to pause for moment...and conceal my smile...and to find the words to explain why I say that.

I think the question she asked had something to do with how to spell the number 2. I think I went on to explain how there are a few different "tos" [two, to, too] and cited examples of each. I must have ended by saying something like, "In this case, you spell 2 't-w-o'."

It was actually much harder than it sounds to explain why you use a certain phrase over and over again. But I was so happy that Maya asks me these sort of questions. It makes being her father so much more enjoyable.

End of the World

The other day Maya and I were driving and she asked something like, "Where is the end of the world?" I had to ask her to repeat her question because I really didn't understand it. She said again, "Where is the end of the world?" I told her the world is a ball, like an orange and reminded her that she has seen a globe before. But she didn't like my answer and rephrased her question, "No, when will the world end...when all this stuff goes away?" I saw in the rear view mirror she had her hands stretched out and was referring to all the stuff around us.

Man. I didn't know how to answer her question. Why would a five year-old be asking such questions? Why wouldn't a five year-old ask a question like that? I guess it's only natural to ask those sort of questions. I think I told her we didn't know when the world would end, but that only God knows that answer. I guess she was satisfied with that answer because she didn't ask any more questions.