Baby-Dog-Whistle Soup

barrelmakersdaughter.com ♦ July 19, 2012 ♦ 2 Comments

Today was a big day in the life of my older daughter, Brittany. This morning she called to say she had just been offered a job in her chosen field, utilizing the Master’s Degree in Counseling she recently earned. It was her first job interview, and it was a position she really wanted—working with adolescents and college-aged young people in private practice. As I listened to her excited voice on the phone I found a puzzling image in my mind: A three-year-old Brittany and her baby-dog-whistle soup.

Britt had the nearly requisite Little Tykes kitchen when she was young. While on rare occasions she used it to hide a dreaded food (hint to other parents—check behind those plastic cabinet doors often. You might find a big surprise!), it was primarily used for creative purposes. Like so many children, Brittany enjoyed pretending to cook us versions of her favorite dinners, offering plates of invisible macaroni and cheese, hamburgers, spaghetti, and the like. We would go through the motions of eating those items, pantomiming the chewing and offering our grateful praise of her wonderful meals. One day Brittany branched out on her own, and proudly offered us a bowl of baby-dog-whistle soup. When asked what that was, she answered with that exasperated sound that only a child can muster (the one that conveys, “Hello! I thought these adults were supposed to be smart!”) She tipped the small, yellow bowl towards us to show what was clearly obvious to her: A “soup” containing a tiny dollhouse-sized baby, a small plastic dog (dollhouse-sized, too) and a whistle. Well, of course, it was baby-dog-whistle soup. What else could it be? She beamed at her creation and we beamed back at her.

That’s the vision that appeared in my mind as I listened to Brittany this morning. I know it’s like this for other parents, too—no matter how old our children may grow to be, at key moments in their lives we often flash back to very young versions of them. Brittany so proud to show us her creation many years ago and Brittany so excited to share her first foray into her professional life—these two events have co-mingled for me and likely will remain linked in my mind. The joy I feel now is the joy I felt then: my child experiencing a sense of self-worth through accomplishment. I know today she is thrilled that the hard work of her Master’s Degree earned her the job she really wanted. But I also know that all those years ago her heart soared, too, when the creation of her three-year-old mind earned parental smiles for a bowl of baby-dog-whistle soup. The magnitude of accomplishment may have grown through the years but my child’s happiness behind it remains the same. As a parent, that’s about the biggest privilege one can experience: seeing your child happy. Congratulations, my sweet Brittany, on your joyful success!