Thursday, January 11, 2007

Emma the Dancing Queen

Wednesday I was late picking Emma up from preschool. I arrived as the last van was pulling away. So I left the car running next to the curb and went inside the school in search of my daughter.

I found her with Miss Jill and Miss Tracy in her classroom. They were cleaning up for the day and Emma was sitting in the reading corner with her purple jacket on, looking at a book. I poked my head in the door to make sure Emma was still there, and my daughter leapt out of her chair and charged straight at me screaming: "Daddy" - ah, sweet music to my ears!

So as I'm hugging her and greeting her with my traditional "Hey there sweetie pie", I asked how her day went. Fine she said. I apologized to the teachers for being late and told them I appreciated them letting Emma stay a few extra minutes. They said it was no problem, Emma was wonderful (of course).

Then they asked me if we square danced at our house. I thought it an odd question. I replied, "Well...um...we dance...sometimes in a square like fashion...but it's not really square dancing...why do you ask?"

They said that today Emma led the whole class in a dance. Miss Tracy proceeded to demonstrate the dance. I told her that I'd never seen that dance before. Emma must have made it up from her imaginative little head. Miss Jill laughed. She said Emma was a born leader. I laughed.

I asked Emma, "Where did you learn that dance?" According to Miss Tracy's demonstration, it consisted of everyone standing in a line holding hands, and then Emma would sing a song and everyone would move forward according to the words of the song, and then move back a few steps at Emma's command. Kind of like a line dance - one made up by a three year old.

Emma replied, "Well, I kind of made it up!"

"What do you call your dance?"

"Well, I call it the 'Tree Dance'."

"The Tree Dance? Why?"

"Because."

"Oh."

So now Emma has taught her brothers, mother and grandmother to do the Tree Dance. I tried to get her to show me her dance moves this morning, but no luck. Argh.

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