The Cheshire Cat Grin

I just want to relate two small incidents with Ricki. Yesterday her older brother told me that on Saturday he had played cards with Ricki, and she won “fair and square”.

Today, I wrote a short text in Hebrew for Ricki to read. Hebrew is her native language, and a second tongue to me. But in general, my level is above hers, as I learn along with her, and yet retain more. But today as we were reading, she pointed to the word "pitom" (suddenly), asked “What is THIS?” I answered 'pitom'”. She replied, “It can’t be; it doesn’t have an ‘aleph’” (a silent letter). So I looked the word up, and sure enough, it has an “aleph”. I corrected it with a song in my heart. No only was she better than me at spelling that word, she asked about an unfamiliar word, and had the “gumption” to correct me.

Picture me with the grin of the Cheshire cat……

The bus seat partner

Today Ricki and I were returning from her swimming lesson, by way of bus. She wanted to seat separate from me. She likes the independence, so sometimes I agree to sit elsewhere. At first it seemed that she just wanted the extra empty seat for her bag. But as the bus started filling up a bit, she moved the bag to allow others to sit. She saw a twwn get on, and asked her “Want to sit with me?”
Well, the teen was amazing. Even though she was with a friend, she caught on that Ricki wanted company, and told her friend “I’m sitting here.” She talked very nicely to Ricki. Five bus stops later we alighted; the teen waved, and went to join her friend.
The nicest thing is that she did it all very naturally, and not in a “Pity party” way.

Good for Her!
(And good for Ricki to show a bit of initiative!)

The Vegetable Buy

The other day I had gone to buy produce, and had it delivered to my house. Once it arrived, it was laying in the salon in a cardboard box, waiting to be unpacked, sorted, and put away. Somehow I was too busy to do so (I often am; this job is frequently a one o’clock at night job). After several hours I suddenly noticed that the box was almost empty.
Opening the refrigerator door, I discovered “half havoc”. The fruit bin was full of vegetables, and the vegetable bin had apples and tomatoes, topped with (YIKES!) heavy potatoes. And even though the rearranging took more time than the job initially would have, and even though some tomatoes complained to me about the inquisition they had suffered from the potatoes, all in all I was pleased. Ricki had taken the initiative to do a big job. She simply lacked training, and that was my fault.