A ticket to anywhere!

Yesterday, I had lunch with my 4 year old daughter at her day-care. It’s spring break, so this is a different location from her normal pre-school. I sat in the small chairs with the kids and every child in the room had a story to tell. As we were eating corn dogs, baked beans and mandarin oranges, the boy to my right (Daniel) told me about his house, his dog, his grandparents and pretty much every other detail that he could think of. Not wanting to ignore my daughter, nor the other kids at the table, I tried to carry on only two conversations at a time. Daniel, however, was persistent and wanted to tell me that he liked my tie, my ring and my white collared shirt. Each time, he would politely tap my arm to get my attention. I would ask him to wait, finish my conversation with another child and then return to his inquisition.

At the end of the meal, I shook his hand and thanked him for letting me join him for lunch. As I did so, I noticed the ketchup and bean stained finger prints on the sleeve of my shirt. That certainly made me smile and left me a nice reminder the rest of the day of my enjoyable meal.

After the meal, I stood in line with the children while they took turns washing up and preparing for nap time, which my daughter is staunchly opposed to. While negotiating my escape back to work with my daughter, another child (Fawn) was vying for my attention. She also wanted to tell me about her family and her stuffed horse (not pony) that she cuddled with during nap time.

This morning, I again dropped off my daughter at her “new” day-care and as I was leaving was approached by Fawn. She had a small slip of paper in her hand. She quietly handed it to me and said it was my “ticket.” I said thank-you and she elaborated that I could, “go anywhere you want to with it.” All it had on it was the number 11.

In my structured adult mind, I initially assumed that I was the 11th person to get a ticket. From a four year old’s perspective, however, I wonder if all of the tickets probably had the same writing on them designating some secret four-year old code. Either way, I’ve been resisting my adult mindset of viewing this ticket as a plane-ticket or ability to go some place exotic and far-away. Instead, I’ve decided to keep the ticket in my coat pocket and whenever I need to get away, I’ll pull out the ticket and think of the refreshing meal I had with the four-year olds. Better yet, I may just go back for lunch with my new friends . . . only next time I won’t wear a white shirt.