| Musings |

Of Deli Rolls and Four-Year-Olds

By Ilana Keilson | September 9, 2024

Names aren’t the only thing four-year-olds make up

For entertainment and comedy, you can’t do much better than have a conversation with your average four-year-old. I say this with no small amount of confidence, having shared a residence with several of these creatures over the last decade or so.

My current four-year-old model is somewhat more amusing than average. Take, for example, this past Friday. I had picked her up from school and continued on to pick up my older daughter and her friend. Said friend, being friendly, inquired of Tova Miriam, “What is your name?” To which Beloved Offspring, without missing a beat, replied, “Deli Roll.”

I’m not making this up.

Deli Roll, though more unusual than most others, is just one in a long list of monikers that have little relation to darling daughter’s title of inauguration. Every morning, my precious one and I go through some variation of the following routine:

Tova Miriam: Mommy, can we still play that game and you’re the mommy and I’m your kid and I am six years old, but I had a birthday so now I am…. Now I am…. What comes after six?

Me: (acquiescent parent that I am) “Seven. Sure, Tova Miriam.”

Tova Miriam: I’m not Tova Miriam. I’m Shana Devora.

Me: Okay, Shana Devora, can you please tell Chani to get dressed and come down for breakfast?

Tova Miriam: No.

Me: Why not?

Tova Miriam: She’s not Chani. She’s Adina Penina.

So as if I weren’t having a hard enough time remembering my children’s names, now I have to remember a whole new set. Every day. And sometimes the names aren’t even really names.

“Leah Bina!” I’ll call.

“She’s not Leah Bina. She’s Meerka Banna.”

Names aren’t the only thing four-year-olds make up. Mine actually spends about eighty-five percent of her time in a completely alternate reality. To wit:

Tova Miriam: Mommy, can I push the baby in the carriage down the steps and wash her clothes in the toilet?

Me: What? No! Stop it right now!

Tova Miriam: No, Mommy, for pretend.

Me: Oh. Okay. For pretend. Sure. Go ahead.

I’ve learned to verify the reality of the situation anytime she asks for anything.

Tova Miriam: Mommy, can we have gum and jelly beans?

Me: No. It’s not Shabbos.

Tova Miriam: It’s Shabbos for pretend.

Me: Ok. You can have pretend jelly beans.

Tova Miriam: No, not you! I’m talking to the Pretend Mommy.

Four-year-olds also know how to turn your own brilliant methods against you. A brilliant parenting tactic I picked up somewhere is to give children a choice when they don’t actually have one so they feel they’re in control of their lives to some extent (when in reality every waking moment of their day is controlled by some grown-up force or other). So when I want her to get dressed, instead of commanding, “Get dressed!” I gently offer, “Do you want Mommy to dress you, or do you want to do it yourself?”

Tova Miriam has adopted this for her own uses. This morning she asked me, “Mommy, do you let me have a candy or vitamin Cs?”

Another fascinating thing about four-year-olds is the rearranging of their totem pole. Up until recently, I held the tippy-top position. In a two-year-old’s mind, “Mommy” is up there, one step beneath Hashem. Along comes school, and drops you down about seven rungs. I now play eighth fiddle to a whole horde of morahs, directors, principals, and friends. This was displayed quite clearly recently as my precious one sang one of her Purim songs.

“The Yidden were so scared

They heard about Haman’s plan.

Won’t Hashem save us

From Haman’s hand?

They davened hard and fasted all day,

‘Please take this decree away.’

They did teshuvah every braid….”

Me: Whoa! Whoa! Whoa, there! Every braid? Like a braid in your hair?

Tova Miriam: Yup.

Me: Are you sure it’s not something like “Did teshuvah and prayed?” Prayed means davened, see? That’s what the Yidden did. They davened. “Braid” doesn’t make any sense.

Tova Miriam: Nuh-UH! Morah said, “Every braid.”

Me: But braid makes no sense!

Tova Miriam: Yuh-HUH! Morah said!

“Morah said,” you see, is the ultimate argument ender. You can’t argue with “Morah said,” even if you’re pretty sure that’s not what Morah said.

Even Tova Miriam’s friends seem to hold more sway than I once did. One day Tova Miriam came home from kindergarten without the usual bounce in her step. “Rivki said there’s a yellow-and-purple monster that eats children in the arts-and-crafts closet.”

“Hmmm,” I said. “That sounds scary. But there’s no such thing as a purple-and-yellow monster that eats children. Besides, Rabbi Abrams is very careful to check the whole building every day, and he always makes sure there is nothing dangerous anywhere. So I’m pretty sure there’s no monster in the arts-and-crafts closet.”

“Yes, there is! Rivki told me. And I think I saw its hand sticking out.”

“Tova Miriam, I assure you there’s no monster in the arts-and-crafts closet.”

No dice. So I put in a phone call to Morah.

The next day, when Tova Miriam came home from school, the bounce was back. “Morah said there’s no monster in the arts-and-crafts closet.”

Well, there you have it. Morah said.

(Originally featured in Family First, Issue 910)

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