"Once upon a time, I was a little girl, just like you," I tell my 3-year-old granddaughter.
And she squinches up her nose, shakes her head, and says, "No, you weren't."
I show her pictures of me when I was 2 and 5 and 8. I say, "See. I had hair just like yours." I show her my fourth-grade school picture. "Look. Here I am." I call my childhood friend Rosemary and say, "Rose? Talk to Charlotte. Tell her how old we were when we met." And Rose tells her that we were 7 and in second grade.
But Charlotte remains unconvinced.
I've told her that if you lose a tooth and plant it in the ground and water it every day for 1,412 years, you can grow a real live person. I've told her — to the tune of a song — that if you unscrew your belly button, your legs will fall off. (It's a very catchy song). I've told her that if you eat too much Marshmallow Fluff straight from the jar, your tongue can get stuck to the roof of your mouth and then you can't talk or eat Marshmallow Fluff forever.
And she's believed all these things.
But believing that her Mimi was a child who looked a little like she looks? This is inconceivable. "Silly Mimi," she says, hop-skipping away.
| Can your grandchildren believe you were once young? |
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Yes; they can see it 43.5%
No; they want proof 56.5%
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Like Mother, Like Daughter
Her mother was the same way. She could never imagine her grandmother young. Every time Grandma came by and sat at the kitchen table and told a story about wgrowing up in Glasgow, Scotland; about walking to school with her friend Besse Williamson; about riding a scooter and always having skinned knees; about wishing for years for a dollhouse she saw in a shop window, wishing even when she was too old for a dollhouse, Julie would ask, "What color was your hair, then, Grandma?"
And Grandma would always say, "It was blond, just like yours."
But Julie, like Charlotte, just couldn’t believe.
And then one day she did. One day she could picture a slim little girl with golden curls and scabby knees, not a grandma with gray hair riding a scooter up and down High Street. One day she could see a 9-year-old with a black bow in her hair standing outside her flat, waiting for her brother to come home, waiting in silence because their father had just died. One day she could feel for the 15-year-old, leaving home, leaving her friends and going with her family to live in a new country. And she stopped asking, "What color was your hair then?"
The Age of Not Believing ... and Then Believing
Charlotte thinks that a cow, painted by an artist friend on my bathroom wall, can reach out and get her. She's okay with the duck and the pig and the birds and the butterflies. But the cow sends her running up 13 stairs to a bathroom where fish are the decor. "I like fish," she says.
Her brother is only 6, but he laughs at this. He laughs at the idea of planting a tooth and growing a person, too.
He told me a few weeks ago that when his father's father — "my Grampy," he says — "was my age, his parents had to give him away to be raised by strangers because of a big war," because they were trying to "protect" him, he explained.
"He had blond hair like me," Adam said. And I thought, when did he get so wise? When did he learn that a painted cow can’t hurt you but that a war that separates you from your parents can?
"Once upon a time, I was a little kid like you, Adam."
And Adam believes me.
Tell us! What do your grandchildren believe? Or not believe? Respond in the Comments area below.
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