Robyn Anderson

I thought ‘this kid doesn’t have a chance’ when I first saw the three year old put the death grip on the baby but I’d forgotten how kind and adaptable children naturally are. Now that Big Sister is five she’s a shepherd and an explorer and and all those other things she’ll struggle with when she realizes it’s always going to be her out the door first. She is now five and in the weekend she had an emergency that required getting her father to Face Time us to show us her glasses. She is not visually impaired but has a pair of wonderful big dark frames she puts on whenever seriousness is required. Her sister, ‘broke my glasses and I want Poppa to fix them!’ Oh dear. If it had just been that I think it would’ve been fine but it was followed up with ‘Can we come to your house?’ I was opening my mouth for the reply when she added, ‘When the virus is gone?’ It was wonderful to say yes but it also made me wonder what little minds make of this arbitrary word that now controls us. She can’t see a virus and has had no-one she knows get sick from it. I am just grateful that she hasn’t decided it’s a con to keep us apart. Hopefully the look on my face is enough to tell her it’s true. Before we could explain why Poppa couldn’t fix her glasses right now, some friends came to visit her and off she went to entertain them and the glasses and the virus soon become another blip in an otherwise uncharted future. Lets hope it includes air travel PDQ!