One day, when two of my children were only 4 and 3 years old, they wanted to play “let’s pretend” with their dad and me. My older daughter, as older children often do, declared herself the director.
“You and Dad sit over there”, she commanded. “Now, my brother and I are going to be the father and mother you are the day care center.”
With that, the two of them brought us a couple of dolls, kissed them goodbye and went to the next room.
“What happens next?” I called.
“Oh, you play with the babies and then we go to work for awhile and come back and give you a check.”
“And what are you doing at work?” By now I’m curious about where this is going.
“We talk to people and do stuff and get tired.”
With that, they came back in the room, handed us “checks” made of some coupons I had lying around and took their babies off for bath time and stories.
It was hard for my husband and me not to laugh. They were so serious about it. Ahh. A kids’-eye view of adult life. We go do something mysterious at this thing called work, get tired, and then collect them and real life begins again. That was my first indication that maybe we needed to tell our kids a little bit more about the work that took us away from them all day.
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