Pennies Filled With Love

Soooooo, I bribed B to go preschool today.  With cold hard cash. I didn’t really mean to, I swear. 

Someone mentioned the idea of a “transitional object” to help ease B’s sadness at dropoff.  Basically you get a small object, infuse it with your love in front of your kiddo, and then give it to them to hang on to during the day when they are away from you.  Seems simple enough.  Well, yesterday morning, as B was wailing and clutching onto my leg for dear life, I hastily and rather haphazardly decided to give the transitional object idea a whirl. In a moment of desperation I told him I had a VERY SPECIAL surprise for him and I would give it to him if he would just stop crying for 3 seconds. And then I dug frantically through my purse looking for a special, magical, love infused trinket that I could give him. Except, I really should have thought this through a bit better, because I didn’t actually HAVE a very special surprise at my disposal.  Chapstick? Old hair tie? Deformed bobby pin? York peppermint patty wrapper?? Hmmmmm…the pickings were pretty slim. And then I remembered B’s love of coins, so I grabbed a few and told him they were magic coins filled with my love.  He was intrigued, but mostly unconvinced.  So I resorted to what I do every morning: prying him off me and then running away while he melted into a puddle of uncontrolled sobbing.  Transitional object fail. Or so I thought.  Today, as I was getting ready to leave him at preschool, tears began to well up in his eyes and he said to me “do have any pennies filled with love?”  Huh????  “I need some pennies.  With love. So I’m not sad.”  Ummmmm.  Yes! Yes I do have some pennies! And I will fill them with all the love on earth if it will help you not be the saddest sad panda who ever had a sad. So I reached into my wallet and pulled out a penny, kissed it repeatedly (ewe, did I really kiss money??? Note to self: boil lips), and then handed it to him.  “I need three pennies” he said.  (What is it with 3 year olds? Always negotiating for more.  Sheesh.)  Sorry kid, I only have the one.  And it’s EXTRA SUPER magical.  Better keep it in your pocket.  And then, glory of glories, B walked over to his teacher, who was reading a story, and sat on the floor with the other preschoolers. Not a single tear! I was dumbfounded but decided not to press my luck so I high tailed it out of there, as I walked out the door B smiled, waved, and yelled, “Bye mommy!”

 

I have no idea if he’ll still have the magic penny by the end of the day today – yesterday he lost the 31 cents I handed over – but if I have to give him a new penny every day for the rest of his schooling career considered it done. So yeah.  I paid my kid to go to school today, and I’ll probably do again tomorrow.