I drove my seven-year-old daughter to her dance class one night. These duties typically fall to my wife, so I like to make the most of these bonding experiences. On the drive home, when I looked back at her in my rearview mirror, I caught her making a face of befuddlement or annoyance. Since I wasn’t sure, I asked her if everything was alright.
“Yes!” She said brightly.
“Then why were you making that face?” I asked.
“It’s a secret.” She replied.
This prompted me to launch into a longer-than-necessary explanation regarding secrets and when they are okay to keep and when they are not okay to keep. As much as I hate to admit it, there is no shortage of evil looking to prey on the weak and innocent regardless of where you live.
When we arrived home, I explained to my wife what had happened and why we had been discussing secrets. It was very helpful because my wife was able to come up with a way to distinguish between good and bad secrets in a way that made sense to our seven-year-old daughter — except when she asked my daughter which type of secret it was, my daughter didn’t know … so she revealed the truth:
“I don’t know why I get this feeling, but I get this feeling that there are ‘wishes’ under my bed or in my play tent in my bedroom! I look for them whenever I get this feeling, but I’m never able to find them! All I find is carpet and that brown thing!" She exclaimed, referencing the central air vent in the floor. "I keep looking, but I never find them! I still can’t help but feel like they’re still there and I just can’t find them!”
Of course not.
