Da Keiki Blog

Conversation in public but quietly, and most important in German. Leilani’s view is not endorsed by the parents.

L: Look Mommy, that lady has 5 children!
S How awful. What would you do if you had that many kids?
L: Oh, I would give one away to the orphanage.
S: How would you choose?
L: The one that behaved the worst.

My view was a little biased then but now the bias is even worse after watching Idiocracy. It’s a satirical comedy about the evolutionary effect of the dysgenics of the dumbest people having the most kids. (Bad movie, don’t watch. Andy adds: It’s not that bad a movie.)

We visited Kelby and Belen at their beautiful house in Marin county. The kids got to play a little…

…and then we went on a very foggy hike…

…found cool plants: native Pacific Stonecrop between moss and lichens…

and a buried treasure (which we carefully reburied and left since we suspected some treasure hunt or geo caching game)

We finished the visit with a nice lunch.

09/19/2010

In a different post I described a day with Rosemary in SF, when Leilani was sworn in as a Junior Ranger. Seeing how much it means to her and how much she treasures her badge I thought it deserved its own post.

In the SF Maritime museum were beautiful murals and they had a treasure hunt on for children.

Leilani loved it and found most of the items.

Since she did so well the friendly ranger gave her another booklet to her to find more things, and to note sounds and try things. These are the cover and a few pages from the activity booklet.

(unfortunately all the nice ocean sounds were overpowered by construction noises)

…and there was a big reward at the end. Leilani was sworn in as a junior ranger, to protect the parks and the environment and received a ranger badge. She repeated the long and complicated oath…

… and talked for hours about busting flower pickers and people who feed squirrels in the parks.

Leilani and I were making a list of people to write Christmas cards to.

L: “Oh, the nice man… Inge’s husband… but he died… that’s too bad. I wonder if he has a new life by now. Maybe he is already celebrating his first birthday.”
S: “I don’t think so. That wouldn’t work out… 9 months pregnancy plus a year… but then of course we don’t know at what point the soul comes to the body. Maybe at the beginning of the pregnancy, maybe towards the end, I don’t know.”
L (obviously trying to answer my question, but getting sidetracked): “…You know when people die they go to heaven. Then they sit in a big chair and talk to god and tell him about the good and the bad things they did, and then they get wishes. If they were good they can pick whether they want to be an angel in heaven or they want a new life. If they were really good they get a lot of wishes, and they can pick their parents, which part of the island they want to live on, or if they want to be an animal, they can pick their brothers and sisters and their hair color.”
S (after digesting the monologue): “And what happens to the really bad ones?”
L: “They have to stay in heaven. There is a special cage, like a house with many rooms and it has many computers and they have to stay there until they thought a lot about why they were bad and want to be better and then god comes by, and lets the ones out who are better now and the others need to stay. The ones that come out get one wish then.”
S: “Do you remember any of this or do you just think that’s the way it is?”
L: “I remember a little bit. I was sitting in the big chair and talking to god and I got 5 wishes. I don’t remember anything about the life before.”

Of course her views reflect a lot of believes of people close to her, and a bit picked up from a website that I made for a client on the life after death and from the Egyptian Rosicrucian museum. That cage-like house sounds a lot like a timeout place too. I think it is interesting how she combines all of it and puts it into a system where all can be true and that suits her well.

All that talking about death reminded her about the mummies at the Rosicrucian Museum and how it gave her nightmares. She proceeded to tell me about them – now 4 months later. For someone who never saw horror movies they were pretty creative, and very scary, mummies getting up, walking, trying to grab her, coming out of trees…

Andy adds: The part about picking and getting wishes sounds like a children’s book we have. A Himalayan woodcutter dies and as he reincarnates, he gets to choose from all the galaxies, suns, planets, peoples, etc. and ends up in the same village, but this time he chooses to be a girl. Also, it sounds a lot like visiting Santa just before Christmas (hmmm). The bad people place sounds a lot like tech-job cubicles, (Sonja adds: Dilbert’s Hell, but Leilani doesn’t really read Dilbert yet) which Leilani has seen at my work–but she usually loves to see my office. Also, maybe I should spend less time in front of the computer after Leilani goes to bed.

Speaking of scary things, Leilani wanted the Rudolph animated TV special on DVD but when she got it she was still very scared of the Abominable Snow Man in it. That night she came into our bed in the middle of the night (not just in the early morning like she sometimes does), so she must’ve been having really bad dreams of the ‘Bominable.

I got a box from the garage and put Leilani’s old artwork in. The papers had been sitting in an untidy stack on an unstable shelf and had grown to the point that not a single sheet would fit.

I remembered all the times I had bargained with her in vain about throwing out this or that. Leilani is very attached to her art. When I told her this morning, I was going to put it away, she was fine with it. L: “… but I can open the box later again?” S: “Yes, it will always belong to you and we’ll keep it safe.” L: “Maybe when I’m a teenager… but then I’ll be in school so much…” I thought it was so strange to hear that from a 5 year old.

It took me almost an hour to sort it and put it in the box. I though about the chances that someone else would see this or that piece again. Will Leilani open this box, ever? Or will I? Other than to hastily stuff in more before the move?

Even for me there were lots of memories attached to the colorful drawings and paintings and crafts. I pulled out way too many for her portfolio, and a few for gift-wrap – of course I’ll need to ask her permission first, but she usually allows it to be used for wrap and greeting cards.

I’m sad to close the box. Good thing there is plenty of art on the fridge to cheer me up.