Friday, June 7, 2013

Pleasantly Defiant

That’s how I described Olivia to my mom yesterday afternoon as the girls frolicked in my mom’s pool, my mom and I lazed in chairs on the deck watching them and every so often, Olivia would climb out of the pool to pee in the grass.

One of the times she climbed out of the pool, Olivia spied my mom’s watering can and asked if she could fill it with water from the pool to wash her feet.

My mom nodded her consent and O went about her foot cleaning duties.

Except, she wasn’t so much washing her feet as she was making mud all the way around the pool. She’d dip the watering can in the pool and it would get too heavy for her to lift over the pool’s edge and then she’d have to push the pool’s edge down to haul the watering can, water spilling everywhere, out of the pool.

After the fifth or so time, I told her that was enough.

She put up one finger and said, “Okay, but I just need to do it one more time.”

I told her she was not doing it one more time, she was done making mud.

She smiled a very pleasant, non-naughty smile. “Just one more time.”

“Olivia, I said no. Time to stop.”

“I just want to do it once more.”

We repeated this cycle at least five times, each of us maintaining a very pleasant tone of voice and Olivia continue to smile at me as if her smile would disarm my negativity toward her actions.

I finally just got up and took the watering can out of her hands. She tilted her head at me as if trying to figure out just how serious I was, came to the correct conclusion that I was quite serious and then she went to find a cup, which obviously held much less water and thus was easier to fill and lift from the pool.

When I’m in the right mood, this pleasant defiance is pretty amusing. She honestly thinks that if she just repeats her wishes often enough, always very pleasantly, never bratty, eventually she’ll wear me down.

It never happens, poor kid. But I do so love to watch her delightful tenacity in action.

1 comment:

Charity Deleon said...

Gottta love her determination!!