our baby boy, who is peacefully sleeping in our bed, the place he seems to like the most at night...
and my daughter's doll, we call it a "doudou" in French, who fell asleep against a turtle friend right before my girl left for school. I don't know if "Doudou" is a boy or a girl, according to what it is wearing, it must be a girl. This is a little skirt I made for Doudou years ago. My daughter has got this doudou when she was nine months old from my sister Elise and since then it has been her very best doll friend! Now it looks old and greyish but it just shows how much this Doudou has been loved and conforting when she had a hard time sleeping, and how much she played with it. I have been so careful that she didn't lose it! I think those toys are treasures. I still have my doudou from when I was a very small girl. It was a piece of my sheet. I couldn't live without it.
Once, my daughter went to the countryside with my mother and she lost her Doudou there. What a drama! She was so sad, and I must admit I was too. Me and my sister Elise we took the car went back to the place where they had last seen Doudou, I made posters with its picture and put them up everywhere in the village. We called the places where they had been to ask if anybody had seen Doudou, we really thought it was lost. I made another one in fabric that didn't look at all like Doudou but I tried my best to make it resemble the original one! And then after a few days someone called me to say that they had found Doudou in the grass, in a farm where my mother and my daughter had gone to pick up fruits and vegetables. We went back there again with my sister and took Doudou back home, it was all wet and dirty from its nights outside but we were so happy!
Another time she lost it again. She had come back from her cousin's and it was time to go to bed. She couldn't find it anywhere in her room. We searched her bag and the entire apartment (which was quick since at that time we were living in a very small place!), no Doudou! My man went out to look for it in the street, all the way from the metro station to our place and even further away where we hadn't even gone. Still no Doudou. My little girl was desperate. She finally fell asleep, feeling very sad and after crying a lot because she couldn't sleep without it and she was missing it so much. It was around midnight and I kept thinking of Doudou, lost somewhere, I just couldn't resign to admit that it was lost for good this time. So I decided to go out and try one last time to look for it. I went back to the metro station and examined every little spot in the dark. Finally, all of a sudden, I saw something on a bench: here it was! Doudou was sitting still and lonely, waiting for someone to take it back home! I fell sooo happy, I ran back home and put Doudou in my daughter's arms for her to find it in the morning when she would wake up.
Why was I so happy when I found it? First of all, I knew my daughter was extremely sad that she had lost it. Also, I think this doll represents something deep about her early years, when I look at it, it reminds me of those days and it has grown with her, it is like a soft and tender link between her then and her now, a part of innocence and early childhood that she is not ready to leave behind yet... I know some people may say that she is way to big to keep this doll in her bed at night, but I don't agree. She will grow, she will become a teenager and then an adult. Why be in a rush? Childhood is a gifted period, and all children should have time to enjoy it. I think it is so sad when children are forced to grow too fast, like they have to work or to be conscient of the hardness of life and the cruelty of men at an early age.
Now Doudou never goes out except when she goes to a sleep over, but it stays in her bag and just goes out when it is bed time. I just don't want her to lose it. I hope she can always keep it, like I did with mine, the only material thing I kept from my childhood, with a broken jewel... If she doesn't want it anymore, I will hold on to it, I will put in a drawer and keep it as a treasure of her childhood... My God, it is hard to see your children grow... It brings tears to my eyes to write those things. She is going to turn ten.. I feel so proud of her, and I love seeing her getting bigger, slowly walking towards teenagehood. But I wish she could always keep this innocence, this child smile that she has, this child heart that makes her do things like putting her pyjamas inside out just to be funny and because she doesn't want to bother... Sometimes I wish I would take more time to cherish those moments. In a way, I have been so serious these past five years: serious when I was going back to university to become a French teacher, serious when I had to give authority to my growing little girl, serious when I fell in love and it was tremendously important for me to do it right this time, and I fell so madly in love with Earl that I really put a lot of myself in this relationship, serious when my dauhgter's homework started to get more complicated and grades were not so great, serious when I had little time between my job and cleaning the house and shopping and cooking well and taking care of my girl and gradually I stopped dancing at home and singing or just humming, I became so seriously involved in all the stuff I had to do, trying to be perfect in everything, feeling bad because I wasn't, I almost forgot that life should be about joy, and that smiling and laughing are the best things... I have noticed that my daughter has been trying to make me laugh and a lot of times I don't. When she is disappointed because her joke didn't make me smile, she sometimes says that I have no sense of humor and I must admit that in a way she is right. Damn, I WANT TO HAVE FUN!!!! And I'm going to start today. I can see my little boy smiling to me and that's what I want to give him: smiles and laughters, just like I did with my daughter when she was a baby, even if times were really tough (separation from her father, no money, having to start anew...) I made a point in showing her the bright side of life. Now she is trying to do the same with me, and I need to follow her example. Yes, she is right, there is nothing wrong in wearing your pyjamas inside out if it makes you laugh!
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| My "doudou" that I called "mon da" which means more or less "my sheet", "drap" meaning "sheet" in French. |
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