Kids never cease to surprise, and my daughter gave me a real gem today!
She and one of her best friends happen to be working on an in-class team assignment this week. It entails researching a famous explorer. By Friday, the two girls are to have prepared a short presentation for their peers, and at least one of them is to have a basic explorer ‘costume’ which can fit over the school uniform.
The explorers were chosen for the students. The girls ended up with Sir Francis Drake (1540-1596).
Today, on the car ride home, my daughter said to me, “So we had this idea for our presentation.”
“Yes?” I inquired.
“Well, Francis Drake had two wives. So we thought we’d dress up like them.”
I held my breath and stifled a disbelieving giggle.
“Was he married to them both at the same time?”
“No. One died.”
This quick answer zapped my funny bone, so I leaned down over the wheel as I steered through downtown Annapolis, desperately trying to make sure my daughter couldn’t see me laugh in the rear view mirror. A comic classroom scene was running amok in my imagination and it just couldn’t be contained.
I asked,”Was one of you planning to stage your death during the presentation?”
Then she laughed, and belted out, “No! But that’s pretty good, Mom!”
The whole car was guffawing now.
She continued, “We were going to dress up one of our American Girl dolls as Francis Drake, but the teacher said ‘No,’ it has to be one of us. He had a beard, Mom. Ick.”
“Oh.”
I didn’t really know what to say just then. I was a little deflated for her. I understand that the point of the assignment is to talk about the explorer’s achievements. I get that. And I don’t want to diminish him or other men in any way.
But I also saw something else in the motives of these two girls – something altogether innocent and lovely: They like being girls. And they thought they could still tell the story – as girls.
There was a time when these thoughts might never have even entered into their minds.
But that wasn’t the case today. Today they wanted to dress up as two women who were there in the wings of history – women who were every bit as real as Sir Francis Drake.
Something about that is good news to me.
Like the lily among thorns, so are you, my love, among the daughters.
-Song of Solomon 2:2 (AMP)
