Nik walks into Anjali’s bedroom as she is getting into her pajamas.  I ask him to turn off the light in his room and he says, “Just a minute, mom.”

Me: “Okaaaay…?”

He turns to Anjali with a knowing look on his face and then says, “Mom, I want to tell you something.”

Me: “Okaaaay…?”

Nik: “Anjali?  At school today, did you say that A______ was handsome?”

Me: !!!!!!!!

Anjali, with a tiny smile on her face: :Yeah?  Yes I did.”

Nik: “I remember you said that.”

Me: “Huh!”

Nik: “I’m going to turn the light off now, mom.”

Me: “Okay!”

On our flight back home, I leave Anjali in her seat eating her snack while I take Nik to the toilet.  When we return, I see the flight attendant standing at our seats, talking to Anjali.  As I take my seat, the attendant asks me softly, with a smile, “What is your daughter’s name?”

I tell her.

Then she tells me that she had the following conversation with Anjali:

FA: “You are such a pretty girl!”

Anjali: “Thank you.”

FA: “How old are you?”

Anjali: “Thuwee.”

FA: “What’s your name?”

Anjali: “I won’t tell you.”

Then the FA told me, “You trained her well!”

Me: “Thanks.”

She should have see her at the airport.

At O’Hare, waiting to pay for lunch, and Anjali strikes up a conversation with a businessman in line behind us.  He comments on her pretty dress, she shows him her nail polish, he enthuses over her nails, she preens, and twirls.

I pay, get the food, and take the kids over to our gate to wait for boarding.  As I pass out slices of pizza, Anjali says, “He’s a nice man.  He yiked my nail polish!”

me: “But he was a stranger.  What are our rules about strangers?”

Anjali, extremely offended: “But he was WHITE!  And he didn’t have a MEAN HOUSE!”

Me: “..!!..!!..!!..!!..”

Me: “Anjali!  I did not know that man.  If I don’t know him, he is a STRANGER!”

Anjali, furious: “BUT HE WAS WHITE!”

Oh. My. God.

Me: “Anjali.  He can be white. black. blue. yellow. green.  I did not know him.  So. He. is. a. Stranger.”

Anjali: “Hmpf!”

And turns away from me.  And eats her pizza.

And I look up to see a black man across the aisle, and a white lady behind Anjali, both looking at me, both smiling, both giving me approving nods.

She definitely needs some more instruction in stranger-danger!

We were visiting my sister in Virginia and on day 4 of the trip, my patience was running very thin.  Nik was at the kitchen table, making odd noises and I lost it and said: “NIK! Can you please stop making those noises…can you please act normal?!”

Nik: “What’s normal?”

then, “I don’t want to be normal.  I don’t like normal.”

Boy…he told me!

Nik: 1, mom: 0.

We are running through the list of things the kids want to put in their backpacks to take on our trip. 

Nik: “My little transformer book, my bumblebee, ALL my Star Wars Clone Wars people…”

Anjali: “Dwawing paypuh, mahkers, gum.  Can I take gum?”

Me: “Sure!  What movies do you want to watch on the plane?”

Nik: “Transformers!  And Star Wars!”

Anjali: “Cinduhwewwa, Sweeping Beudy…”

Nik: “Cinderella.  Yeah, Cinderella.  And ALL the Harry Potter movies.  And the one with the dragons.  And Jackson’s game?”

Me: “Yes, you can take Jackson’s game [a Nintendo ds loaner from a friend]“

It gets quiet in the back of the car, then,

Anjali: “Mommy, can you take a bwanket for me in case I get tiy-uhd?  Coz I might get tiy-uhd on the pwane and then I need a bwanket.”

How does she even know these things…the forethought, the planning…an old soul in a little body.

Anjali is getting so excited about our upcoming trip.  Giggling excitedly, she asks: “Are we going to sit INSIDE the aiwopwane?”

Me: “Yup!”

Anjali: “How are we going to get IN there?”

Me: “We’ll just walk right in and sit down in our seats.”

Anjali: “Where do the aiwopwanes LIVE?”

Me: “In the airport.”

Anjali: “How are we going to GET there?”

Me: “Daddy is going to drive us there in our car, and then he’ll drop us off at the airport.  Then we go in and find our airplane.”

Anjali, giggling again: “And then we will fly UP and UP and UP!”

Me, feeling like I’ve deprived my child of the joy of flying: “Yes honey, and then when we look out the windows, we’ll see clouds.”

And then her little mind is completely blown.

Anjali, out of the blue: “Amber didn’t give me rice last night for dinner, mom!”

me: “Did you ask her for the rice?”

Anjali: “No…? But I wanted rice.”

me: “Well, she can’t read your mind, so if you wanted rice, you should have asked her for it.”

Anjali: “I AST HER!  Her couldn’t find it!”

me: “I showed you where it was in the fridge, did you show it to her?”

Anjali: “No…? But her couldn’t find it.”

me, exhausted: “Okay, Anju, what did Amber give you for dinner then?”

Anjali: “Hambuhguh!”

me: “Oh.  Did you eat it?”

Anjali: “Well…?  I didn’t choose hambuhguh… Amber said that was my choice…but my choice is rice, so I choose to not eat.”

Okay then.

As the kids are climbing into a hot car after a hot day, Anjali is grumbling about, well yes, how hot it is.  Then, “Mommy, turn on the bow dwy-yuh, pweese!”

me: “Okay, I’ll turn on the air conditioner.”

Just call me the Rosetta Stone of Anjali-ese.

Anjali: “Mommy, I’m going to be thuwee, so we can thuwoh away my baby toys, coz [insert nod here] I’m going to be THUWEE.”

Me: “Okay…we’ll just box them up and give them to children who don’t have toys.

Anjali:  “Well…yeah.  Um.  Okay.  We do dat.”

Nik, giving her a big hug: “That’s okay, Anjali.  When we grow up and get married, we’ll have a baby, and then we can give it the baby toys.”

Yeah.

All of our conversations seem to happen in the car…

Nik: “Mom, can we get in a rocket and blast off to the moon?”

me: “Well…maybe you will, one day.”

Nik: ” There’s nuffink on the moon.  It is empty.”

me: “Actually, there is something on the moon…the American flag.”

Nik: “What?!  Who put it there!?”

me: “The first man who walked on the moon…Neil Armstrong.”

Nik: “Who was the second man?”

me: “I don’t remember…” [I'm so embarrassed...and I used to be such a space nut]

Nik: “He remembers.”

me: “Yes, Nik….I’m sure he does.”