She's a man-eater

I think Dominic has a crush. This is not his first crush, and probably not his last. His current crush is named Addy. She moved into our ward over the summer and is in his preschool class. Frequently Dominic asks about Addy and wants to play with her. Well, yesterday morning Dominic started asking about Addy. "Is Addy going to be at preschool today?" he asked. I told him that she would probably be there. He got so excited and ran and got out his paint (which he earned by doing several chores) and some paper and began painting. After a few minutes of painting, Dominic turned to me and stated, "Mom, this picture is for Addy. It's not for you or Dad or Drew. It's for Addy. You're not allowed to touch it." I said, "Okay, I won't touch it. That's nice of you to paint a picture for Addy." Apparently this comment made Dominic feel uneasy about the safety of his painting, and so he again reminded me: "This painting isn't for you Mom. It's for Addy. It's not for you." I backed off to show him my intentions were nothing but good.

After completing his painting, he took it outside to let it dry. Dominic moved a patio chair into the sun and placed the painting on top. He came inside and watched it dry (I kid you not). After a few minutes, he got bored and went to go play with Drew, but every couple of minutes he would come back and check on the painting. The wind began to blow ever so slightly and the paper lifted off the chair about a centimeter. Dominic panicked and ran outside to rescue his painting by bringing it inside to a more mild climate. He continued to check on it and remind me that the painting was not for me.

Dominic took the painting to preschool in his backpack but forgot to give it to Addy. As we were leaving preschool, I asked Dominic if he had given his picture to Addy. With fear in his eyes, he yelled, "No, I forgot." I got him back out of the car to give his picture to Addy. He ran to her and said, "I painted this picture for you, Addy." The paper was folded so she couldn't see the painting. She took one look at it and threw it on the ground. Dominic picked it up and opened the paper so she could see the beautiful piece of art he had so lovingly worked on. She looked at it, gave him a why-would-I-want-a-painting-from-you stare and threw it on the ground again.

I am not exaggerating when I say that my jaw dropped and I gasped in horror. In that moment my heart broke for my poor baby boy who had worked so hard to win the affection of a little girl and had been completely rejected. Dominic's preschool teacher saw what happened and grabbed the picture off the ground and tried to force it into to Addy's hands. She refused to take it. By this point Dominic was walking back to the car, and I just knew that he was crying.

I got back to the car and looked back at Dominic, who I expected to be heart-broken. Instead, Dominic was showing Drew the pictures he had colored at preschool and was happy as a clam. (Tangent: How do we know that clams are happy? I would think that they would be the least happy. We take their pearls to make necklaces, eat their insides, and then use the shell as a decoration in a beach house. I think I'm going to start a new environmental movement: Save the Clams. Or, at the very least, don't say "happy as a clam.") Anywho, Dominic either did not see that Addy threw his picture down or was not fazed by it. I asked him if he thought Addy liked his painting. He answered "yeah" in a why-would-she-not-love-a-painting-by-me tone.

I was so relieved that we didn't have to cross over the bridge of unrequited love...at least not yet.