The Crank

April 16, 2018April 16, 2018Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Speech Language Pathology, Things Kids Say, Writing Tags: Challenges, Family, parenting, Postaday, speech therapy, Tantrums, The Daily Post, Things Kids Say, Toddlers 2 Comments

Photo: Vivian Maier (Girl Crying) N.Y. 1954

She huffed and she puffed and she stomped her small feet. She whined and she cried and she kicked the car seat. She refused to wear shoes, threw her coat on the ground. Made sure everyone heard her for miles around. She tossed food on the floor. Then asked for some more … Like a kid on a mission for the spoiled child edition.

Evening came.

Gramma called.

Mama handed the phone.

“Tell me now, little one, what on earth’s going on?”

“I’m a crank,” the child said in response. “Now Mama’s tired, all on my own.”

For more of Vivian Maier’s amazing photography: http://www.vivianmaier.com/

For The Daily Post

Smiley Moth

April 4, 2018April 4, 2018Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Photography, Reflections, Writing Tags: Be happy, Ditty, Just for fun, Moth, Nature, Photo Challenge, Photography, Smile 3 Comments

Photo: Ofir Asif

Let mouth corners

Up and curl.

Let merriment

Gently unfurl.

That’s all

It takes

For smiles

To pearl.

For The Photo Challenge

Jujus

March 22, 2018March 22, 2018Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Professional Development, Speech Language Pathology, Things Kids Say, Writing Tags: belief, Central Park, children, Magic, Postaday, speech therapy, Talisman, The Daily Post, Things Kids Say 1 Comment

Photo: Samantha Mars

She dragged her book bag up the stairs.

Step, bang. Step, bang.

“It looks heavy,” I noted.

“Yeah,” she huffed and paused to frown in the direction of the patchwork of princesses on the backpack. I found myself wondering whether she was directing discontent at her idolized figures not using their royal powers to, at the very least, summon genie help to manage gravity.

“Want me to help carry the bag for you?” I offered.

She raised an eyebrow as if the mere thought of my definitely-not-princess hands handling her bag was beneath the Disney figures that dignified it.

The first-grader lugged the bag another step and stopped, perhaps to reconsider if there are times when commoners’ help is better than none at all. “Yeah,” she nodded.

I walked down to take the bag from her. The thing was heavy!

“What do you have in there?!” I asked. “Rocks?!”

“Aha,” she nodded sagely, skipped a few steps up ahead of me and swiveled her head to look back at me. “Come faster. I want to show you.”

I lifted the bag (and an eyebrow) in her direction and she giggled. “Sorry… Thanks.”

Once upstairs she indicated I was to clear space for whatever that was, then ceremoniously unzipped the top of her school bag and pulled out a succession of boulders. She placed each with care onto the desk. Several pounds of them.

I waited. The lot looked to me like run-of-the-mill New York stones: mostly dark gray schist dappled with a bit of quartz glint.

She leaned back in her chair and waited. Clearly a reaction was warranted.

“That’s a lot of rocks!” I managed.

“Not regular rocks,” she admonished. “These have magic.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah,” she proclaimed. “They have real magic. And gold, too. Inside.”

I tilted my head a bit to one side and nodded my interest.

She narrowed her eyes at me, weighing the merits of talking to grown ups about matters of magic and gold. “They can even make your wishes come true …”

“But … ” she regarded me before adding, a bit haughtily and perhaps to punish me for my lack of immediate awe, “you do have to believe in them, so they’ll only do the magic for me.”

For The Daily Post

Invisibly Small

March 21, 2018March 21, 2018Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Quotes, Speech Language Pathology, Things Kids Say, Writing Tags: imagination, Invisible friends, play, Postaday, Preschoolers, The Daily Post, Things Kids Say, Toddlers 1 Comment

Photo: Smadar Halperin-Epshtein

They can hide beneath blankets

They can scoot behind doors

They can crawl under tables.

It’s no challenge at all.

They’re a lion

A princess

A pirate,

A ball.

He has friends you can’t see.

They are there

“They’re just small.”

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Life Shambolic

March 3, 2018March 3, 2018Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Photography, Reflections, Writing Tags: Being Human, expectation, Funny, Imperfection, life, Postaday, Reality, Realizations, Reflections, The Daily Post, Truism Leave a comment

Photo: Pinterest

In the messy path of life

Dreams flurry in

Goals exhale partly out,

And in the lovely expectation

Of more order

In a few,

Lives the absolute prediction

That periodic tangle

Will ensue.

For The Daily Post

The Conversant

February 23, 2018Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Speech Language Pathology, Things Kids Say, Writing Tags: children, conversation, Dolls, Funnies, Oops, parenting, Persuasive speech, playing, The Daily Post, Things Kids Say Leave a comment

Photo: A.Cohen

She’s an expert on all matters

Hearts and rainbows

And the crucial importance

Of having everything that glints.

She can wax poetic

On the concept

Of shiny polka dots in pink.

She’s conversant

Beyond measure

On the value of more dolls.

Especially after three had suffered

Unrelenting awful hair-days

Due to dunking

At the sink.

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Suspiciously Quiet

February 14, 2018Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Reflections, Things Kids Say, Writing Tags: Makeup, Mischief, Oh-oh, parenting, Suspicious, The Daily Post, Things Kids Say, Toddlers, Too Quiet Leave a comment

Photo: Pinterest

The quiet lingered enough to have the mother lift her head from the small screen of the phone.

“Emma?” She inquired.

A longer silence returned no response.

She rose and walked toward the child’s bedroom. The three-year-old was outgrowing afternoon naps but sometimes still could be found slumbering amidst her toys.

The door was open. The girl’s room was empty. She peeked into the bathroom. Empty, too.

“Emma!?” Her voice rose. This time in alarm.

A faint shuffle came from the direction of the master bedroom. Nothing more.

“Emma, where are you?” She demanded.

“Here …” The extra pause and small voice held suspicious hesitation.

Urgency made the few steps feel oddly prolonged. The woman felt heartbeat pulse in the space between her tongue and throat. She pushed open the door …

The child’s cheeks were mascara blotches, her mouth and chin bloomed various shades of lipstick. She had a second set of eyebrows. Her little feet sported rose hues that merged into the floor. The room reeked from a cacophony of perfumes, nail polish, and something that smelled suspiciously like aftershave.

“Hi,” the little girl managed, guilty as they come. “I … I was getting pretty so it be your party.”

For The Daily Post

Life, Simplified.

February 9, 2018Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Professional Development, Speech Language Pathology, Things Kids Say, Writing Tags: babies, Birth, Child's perspective, Funnies, life, speech therapy, speech-language-pathology, The Daily Post, Things Kids Say 6 Comments

Photo: King College, London

“It’s not hard,” she said. “Here, I’ll show you.”

“You make a circle …” she demonstrated. “Then you make eyes and mouth and little bit of hair and hands and legs. See?”

She held the drawing up to show me. Lines for arms and legs sprouted out of the crooked circle ‘head,’ topped by a few smaller lines of a sparse mohawk.

“Then,” she planted the paper back on the table, “you go to the hospital and the doctor makes magic and it’s a baby.”

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Tooth Booth

January 30, 2018Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Professional Development, Speech Language Pathology, Things Kids Say, Writing Tags: Cavities, children, Dental Health, Funny, Literal thinking, speech therapy, The Daily Post, Things Kids Say, Tooth-Fairy 4 Comments

Photo: Craftgawker.com

“I have a cavity in my mouth!” she announced, elated.

“You do?” I couldn’t suppress a smile. The contrast between the child’s delight and the mom’s anguish was too funny.

“Yeah,” the girl expounded, lisping all the way. “It’s a hole! The dentist has a special magic mirror for my teeth and she looked all over and she said I have a cavity.”

“Wow,” I managed and raised an eyebrow at the mom, who nodded solemnly.

“Next week,” the mother sighed. “I’m not looking forward to it …”

I understood why. This little girl could raise roofs at the mere sight of needles. Just ten days prior the mom had shared with me her mortification at the horrified looks people had given her when she’d emerged with her child from a routine blood draw. “Everyone in that waiting room must have been convinced we were slicing her in pieces,” the mom had vented. “I can’t believe they hadn’t all called Child Protective Services or 911.”

“Laughing gas …” I mouthed.

The mom inhaled and shrugged and nodded all in one. Skeptical and perhaps a little hopeful.

“Not next week,” the child pointed out. “Tonight!”

The mom and I exchanged looks.

“What do you mean, tonight?” the mother asked. “Doc Dee said she’ll see us after lunch next Tuesday.”

“Yeah,” the little girl waved this information away. “But I have a cavity,” she stressed. “So the Tooth Fairy is going to get it first.”

She opened her mouth to give us both a good look before turning to me. “I don’t know why the dentist needed a magic mirror,” she added and her voice rose in puzzlement. “I can see my cavity right away already.”

She held her mouth agape and pointed to a newly lost incisor. “See? It’s right here.”

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