I’ve Suffered A Head Injury

Tonight, after making a wildly unpopular dinner (homemade chicken noodle soup – The Princess requested it, then stubbornly refused to eat anything except the noodles… um, I could have saved time and made a pot of pasta instead of doing the whole soup dealy – and no, I didn’t realize it was supposed to be 80 degrees when I planned to make soup for dinner tonight), I put the small cookbook away in the pantry and shut the door. Less than an hour later, I hear a loud boom, and The Princess started yelling and crying.

That cookbook? It fell on her head when she opened the door. At first, I thought she was being dramatic for nothing. I checked her head out and realized there was a big goose egg on it. A big pointy goose egg (she must have gotten hit with the corner of the book?).

Poor kid.

Needless to say, after some crying, and a good deal of time with an ice pack on her head, she was pretty subdued tonight. I feel rotten for not putting the book away well enough – feel horrible that she got clunked with it. It’s weird though – she has always seemed older than she is – and sometimes, it takes a boo-boo to remind me that she’s really just a kid. Sometimes it seems like when she’s hurt is the only time she really NEEDS me. Feels weird to say that about her, because she’s just five. She’s a fiercely independent five year old, though. One of my friends describes her as a little “diva” and it is true. It’s not uncommon for me to say she’s five going on 15 (she always corrects me – because, duh, six comes after five). She’s really an incredibly articulate kid, and she acts quite a bit older than she is.

And sometimes a book falls on her head (or she gets in a fight with her friends, or she gets tired) and she reminds me that she’s just a kid. And she does need me. And that sometimes a hug and a kiss from mom, or a boo-boo pack on the noggin are the answers to all the problems in her world.