“Are there tigers in Austria?” She spoons another load of some sort of whole-wheat-organic-pops-with-not-so-much-sugar-coating into her mouth.
“Just in zoos. And maybe a couple of your high-end circuses.”
“Uh huh.”
“And one in our town.” Holds up hands like claws, grimaces. “Chchchchchch.” (Chchchchch being the guttural unvoiced growl sound, unlike the voiced Grrr growl sound).
She jumps in delighted fright, spraying milk across the table top. Laughs.
“Sorry.” He wipes up milk.
She bares her own claws. “Chchchchch!”
He flinches. “Two tigers at the table, I guess.” He waits until she calms down and starts eating again. “Chchchchch!”
Again, she flinches in real fright, laughing at the same time. Chchchch’s back.
This goes on until they are late for kindergarten, the chchchchching back and forth.
They enjoy being tigers. He remembers a dream – when she had just learned to speak, he started relating to her one he’d had about being in the jungle with her, and confronting a gigantic tiger that wanted to eat them, so she could escape. She looked up at him from the mat where she was reclining as he changed her diaper. “Tiger eat daddy,” she said.
Further discussion revealed that she’d had the same dream.
As life went on, following the dream, he marveled at the way that it – life – gradually inflicted the same wounds on him as the dream tiger had. Appendectomy scars. Various other scars. This was not good, because, since the tiger had eaten him, he had a lot more wounds to look forward to.
There at breakfast, he thought he understood his dream, finally. You face the tiger so your kid can live.
Who knows. Maybe. Dreams are tricky. Dropping her off at the kindergarten, she came to the window to wave. “Chchchchch,” she said, showing claws.
“Chchchch,” he said.
Your kids make me all teary.
Aww.
You should read The Tiger And The Princess to her :)
http://amby.com/go_ghoti/princess.html
sorry about the link thing, joeri. i have html turned off in the comments since that caused problems for another blog back at surreally. i just printed out the story, although it’s already giving me a headache.
Sorry for the headache ;) This is the last of a series of riddles that build up. The first test goes as follows:
There are two rooms. In one room there could be a princess, in the other a tiger. It is also possible that in both rooms there are princesses or tigers. In any case there can only be one princess OR one tiger in each room.
A sign on the door of the first room says: “In this room there is a princess and in the other room there is a tiger”
A sign on the second door says:
“In one of these rooms there is a princess and in one of these rooms there is a tiger”
One of the signs is true, one of the signs is false. Which door would you choose?
It’s called “The Lady or the tiger” and it was made up by Raymond Smullyan. The rest of the tests, you can find here: http://www.chlond.demon.co.uk/academic/papers/Smullyan.htm
Just a note to myself on dream symbols, folks.
Tiger
The fiery and complex stripes of a tiger indicate your captivation with an impulsive new person or plan in life. The behavior of the big cat portends what outcome such a bewildering new influence might bring you. Watch carefully and discern the difference between the flames of rebirth and wanton vicious destruction.
(twiddling moustache) Very interestink…