Counter to Type

Ada was at her friend Jar’s fifth birthday party today and discovered water pistols for the first time; she was quite delighted.

(I know, I know, I’m most remiss not to have introduced them before. As penance I allowed myself to be shot several times by an initially nervous but quickly gleefully transgressive four year old.)

Most of the play consisted of rather tame use of said pistols: Jar was washing the windows of the house when we arrived; subsequent adventures tending to consist not of soaking each other and squealing, but rather squirting balloons, streamers, and other inanimate objects. At one point, Ada and a trio of the boys came upon a pink flamingo statue, and squirted it. “We’re cleaning it,” announced one of them.

A gimlet gleam came to Ada’s eye, and she positively danced with excitement at the thought: “Let’s kill it!”

Three small boys shuffled back very quickly. Ada relented upon seeing their rather horrified reactions.

I put this in the same category as her fairy-mermaid games, which feature Ada, the fairy, with her fairy sword and armour, which are made of “the hardest metal in the world”, killing monsters which have the temerity to menace the mermaids (such as her mother, Lias, and from time to time, her father). Either that or I’ve been reading doo much Dahl and Fleming to her.

Fuck you, gender stereotypes.

In more fuck you, gender stereotypes, last weekend, she got to indulge her interest in cars; the folks from Independent Prestige had set up shop in a storefront to show off some of their Gallardos, Bentleys, and Aston Martins. Ada was taken by the yellow Gallardo, delighted to discover she could almost see over the roof, the matching stitching of the upholstery, and the marching yellow of the brakes; she was enraptured when one of the Prestige team opened the door and ushered her in. She clambered around the driver’s seat; sadly, it’s the closest she’s likely to get to a house-price sports car.

Turning (eventually) away from the Gallardo and its white Spyder twin, she gave the Astons a cursory glance, but was fascinated by the Bentley Flying Spur, with its vast interior, wooden trim, and the separate air conditioning controls for the passengers, an amentity she requested, a week later, for our next car. I was forced to explain that “I would like us to have a car like the Bentley” is a request incompatible with my wallet.

In between she’s been attending the excellent Capital Kaizen school program. She was quite overawed by the occasion and the quality of the other kids (most of whom are at least a year older) on the first morning, but hit her stride after an hour or so, and hit the ground running the next day. The coaching team, from Stu through to his younger assistants, were absolutely fantastic with a little girl who’s desperate to reclaim the simple fluid joy she had for the first 6 months she played. Really well-run, heaps of fun for the kids, and Ada’s keen to go again.