There are plenty of things about my fifteen year old daughter, A, that I love. Such as, her determination, her thoughtfulness, her humour. And all the other stuff I write in her birthday card, every year.
But today, I look at the things I love within a snapshot in time, limited to one waking day, and I notice that in fact this is not a very long window, when you consider the waking hours of a teenager. A’s day starts when she emerges for breakfast at 10.30 a.m, and finishes when she is gone up to her room after dinner ends at 8.30 p.m. She’s not as bad as my son, B, of course, who rarely sees an a.m. with day light in it.
Anyway, I enjoyed a full day with A today, which has become a rarety since lockdown ended, and her friends took over as the priority. She has spent the past couple of weeks in post-lockdown celebration, attending sleepovers, bike rides, boat trips and sunbathing sessions round at other kid’s houses. It’s been like one big rebellion against the enforced 87 days of full-on family time. But today was different, we spent the day together at home, and here are my 5 reasons why I think she’s great:
- She makes choc-chip cookies using a method that pasteurizes the egg, just so that she can eat all the cookie dough, without the need to bake any of it.
- She goes jet skiing in her pajamas.
- She binge-watches ‘Greys Anatomy’, and justifies it by telling us that it has taught her all the terminology she needs in preparation for Med School.
- Her idea of a healthy breakfast smoothie is fresh mango, banana, coconut, topped with Ready-Whip cream in a can, semi-sweet chocolate chips and cookie dough chunks.
- Her favourite scents of all time are freshly licked cat fur, marshmallows over a campfire, and gasoline.
