Dad Stuff

Crane on the Dock

Autumn has begun to feel like autumn; for the first month or so we enjoyed a late summer of cool (but not cold), crisp, brilliantly clear days; that particular spell of the closing of summer and the opening of the colder season which is perhaps my favourite time of year.

That is rounding to a close now; the weather is closing in with early nights, pitch black by the time I trek home from work; enlivened by the lights of the harbour, perhaps, but during the working week the only glimpses of sun are those of a morning walk or time snatched from the office during the day; not yet, though, closing me in the suffocating period where the day is black when leaving the house as well as when arriving back at it.

Red Leaves of Autumn

There are pronounced pleasures, though; the ducks at the Botanic Gardens have not grown fat, as they do in Spring, on the offerings of the people rushing to offer bread to ducklings; they’re eager to enjoy the ministrations of a small girl and her gifts, and my heart soars as my spring enjoys her autumn.

To elaborate on my earlier comments: when a movie starts with a montage of one character’s life which runs through a lost pregnancy (or possibly news of infertility, it’s hard to tell), a lifelong regret at not having fulfilled a dream, the death of one of the principal character’s wife and then plunges into him going to court and being committed to elderly care with the resultant loss of his home, I find myself thinking a number of things; high amongst them are “No wonder Ada wanted to re-watch this with me so she could ask questions about what’s going on after seeing it at her creche’s movie day”, and “What the hell? Did her creche really think this was a great movie for three year olds?”

(And yes, I know a three year old is probably missing/glossing over a bunch of stuff in Up that I might find disturbing or distressing; the fact she wanted to re-watch it with me so she could ask questions rather suggested she noticed something was up, though.)

I can also add that when there’s the scene where Fredrickson sets the chairs back in the house, the most poignant question you can be asked is, “Daddy, why is he putting the chairs back up and sitting in them?”, because getting “Because he misses his wife” out is something of a challenge at that point.

Is it a good movie? Absolutely. But definitely one that may require a bunch of talking through with a small.

(On the other hand it’s less disturbing than Ice Age, which Ada doesn’t, unlike Ice Age 2, want to watch again.)

“Shall we if there’s good music on the radio?”

“No. I want Nightwish.”

“I see. Which Nightwish song do you want?”

“The one where he is running away because they think he has done something wrong.”

Daddy’s little metalhead.

Also, Up. Ada likes it. I found it verging on the harrowing. Good, you understand, but, my, that’s a pile of emotive in a kid’s movie.

Last night I was taking my brother-in-law and niece home from my sister-in-law’s wedding; there was a spirited disagreement between cousin, and the adults about whose house was closer to the wedding venue; when all other arguments failed, the trump card for the five year old was:

Mummy says our house is closest and Mummy is younger than you and old people lose their memory and forget things so I’m right.

The wedding was a great afternoon, and Ada was a complete darling as a flower girl, alongside her cousin; they led their aunt down the aisle perfectly. She capered about during the vows, earning her the kind of stern finger-wagging only a five year old can give a younger relative; her response was to hold the finger and dance about some more, fortunately without whacking the bride or bridesmaids.

The Wellington Aero Club had an open day on Saturday. For a little girl who spent happy hours poking around racing cars in Te Papa a few months ago who likes to go to the airport to watch the planes, and her daddy, this seems pretty much like a heaven-sent afternoon, and that’s how it turned out.

As well as the pictured cockpit sessions in the pictured CT-4E and CJ6 Nanchang, Ada got chances to hop into the pilot’s seat of a Sounds Air Cessna Caravan, although we missed out on the Trojan when the owner needed a bio break.

While I attempted to explain the Trojan and Corsair’s features for aircraft carriers—the Corsair had it’s wings up—I don’t think Ada really grasped the idea of planes that land and take off boats.

The only real disappointments of the day were the tiny two-seat plane, whose owners shut up shop just as we arrived to have a look (I suspect Ada may have been so wedded to it because it looked, well, child-sized), and missing out on a chance to go up for a flight in the Catalina, which had run out of seat allocations by the time I asked. She was, however, a little trooper about it; she was really upset, but avoided any kind of tantrum. I need to make it up to her with a trip on a plane when I can afford it.

One not-so-minor irk, though: a few women earlier in the day had heard my plan and suggested that the whole business was about Daddy using Ada as an excuse to do something. Yes, yes, I know it’s a standard cultural trope that men only do things with their kids to have an excuse to buy things for themselves, and that little girls can’t possibly be interested in aircraft. It’s a bullshit sexist trope, too.

Ada with her OLPC

So, I didn’t get to writing anything for Lovelace day proper. This is probably because I was busy writing about Jean Reno for French class (il est pas rasé). Homework first, people. Although I guess if I was less stupified by poor sleep this week I would have thought to write about a famous woman and combined my homework with an educational exercise re: Lovelace day.

So, I don’t have that. I do, however, have this; a picture of Ada playing with her loaner OLPC, which provides her with many hours of entertainment and budding computer literacy.

Ada: “I am going to make this a chicken sandwich. Chicken is going in the sandwich. He is in my big car.”

Rodger: “Does chicken want to be eaten?”

Ada: “Nooooo.”

Rodger: “Then perhaps chicken shouldn’t go in the sandwich.”

Ada: “Chicken has to go in the sandwich, because it’s a chicken sandwich.”

Ada then stuffs the toy chicken—the same toy chicken, I note that went to hospital with her when she was seriously ill at 7 months—into the cushions making up the sandwich, ordering him to “push your head in!”, throws a towel over it so the sandwich will cook, and then announces:

“Chicken is making a terrible fuss!”

Rodger: “Is that because chicken doesn’t want to be eaten?”

Ada: “Yes. Now you must eat the chicken sandwich.”

Fortunately I had already been designated a triceratops, so no chicken for me.

I’m far too sentimental to have given her any of this cooking and eating my toys. I blame her mother.

Today in kiddie French we read Animal Farm for three year olds.

No, really.

The book was the story of le canard; le canard worked around the farm while the fat farmer lay in bed eating chocolates; le canard worked until he cried with exhaustion, at which point the other animals—la vache, les muttons, and a gaggle of others—stormed the house, threw the farmer from his bed, and chased him from the farm.

Then le canard returned to doing the work around the farm.

“Daddy, when you shave you look like a woman. When mans shave, they look like women.”

I guess I’ve been wearing stubble and short beards more than I realised lately.

Ada also undertook a first today; we carefully counted out sixteen dollars of fifty cent pieces from Pig[1], put them in a drawstring bag, carried them into town. From there Ada went into Unity Books and chose “The Nickle-Nackle Tree” as the very first book she bought with her own money, after first considering a number of other possibilities.

She wants to commemorate this by putting her name on the receipt and keeping it somewhere safe.

[1] Pig is, these days, generally stuffed with small change rather than delicious pretend lemon.

So there I am, listening to the radio, and what comes on but a creche ad for a chain of creches called “Paradise.” I’m sure it seemed like a great idea and all, but hearing repeated exhortations to “send your children to Paradise” just makes me think of cultists or baby suicide bombers.

This is not persuasive.