It's finally time to watch our words and our tone...

I've been "waiting" for this day, "dreading" would be a MUCH more appropriate term, for a long time. I knew it would come, I just wasn't exactly sure as to when. Well, tonight, after I got home from work, Geoff told me that tonight was the night...oh dear...

We hired a dog trainer while I was pregnant with Kaya to avoid this very thing.

I go to therapy on a regular basis to help us avoid this.

But alas, the time has come, where reality mixes with her spongy verbosity:

Kensa, true to form, was whining at the back door. Geoff, in his true form, attempted to be nice and gently tell her to be quiet. But, she persisted in her wascally husky manner, and continued to whine, long and loud. Surely learning from yours truly, Geoff decides to raise his voice at Kensa, telling her, "No, you stay out."

Within seconds, our budding bilingual says, in a tone more stern, loud, and definitive than we've ever heard her use,"No. No. Nein. Nein. Nein. Nein. Nein. Nein. Nein." No pause between the two different negations...simply a continual flow of bilingual no-isms.

On the one hand, I'm clearly dejected. I've been dreading this day, the day I knew would come, the day I "knew" I would hate as soon as it arrived on my doorstep. Life is hard, especially right now. I miss my mom. Geoff's hand is broken. And together, in all of our tiredness, we're raising a one and a half year old. How the hell am I supposed to keep my cool when my 2 dogs are whining, barking, and waking the baby?! As cute as they are, I can't quite keep it together all of the time when one of them runs away for hours and the other one keeps begging at the kitchen counter. I try, dear Buddha knows I try...but reality is brutal sometimes, and so is my tone.

How, oh how, am I going to keep my daughter from "inheriting" my harsh tone with my dogs? Patience? Acceptance? Meditation? No dogs?

I don't have the answer. But what I do have is a bundle of mixed emotions at the fact that, one, our daughter finally "Did what we do, not what we say," and two, because she did it bilingually. I know I have a choice to dwell on whichever emotion I want to...shall I focus on how ecstatic I feel for her smooth bilingualism? Or on the deep-seeded fear based upon the unknown of how to solve our plight?

The answer is obvious...and shockingly, it's not feeling so challengin--the happiness feels like a hot spring welling up through all the other emotions that come so naturally. And what a wonderful experience that is...


(It's not ALL bad...here she is feeding the canine beasts, who have come to love as one of their own!)




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