Nicole Crane

Originally posted on The Progressive Heroine.

It’s a snowy afternoon. I am sick and napping when I feel something wet on my cheek. I open my eyes to see my 2-year-old daughter hovering over me, ready to come in for the kill. As she’s about to plant another kiss on the lens of my saliva-smeared glasses, she realizes that I am awake. She stops mid-pucker and shouts, “Tick! Tick!” (“Tick” is Prince Phillip from Walt Disney’s Sleeping Beauty.)

Oh dear God. She thinks I’m Princess Aurora and, of course, that I must be roused from my poisoned slumber. I close my eyes again, to see what she will do. I cross my hands over my chest and try to look serene. Sure enough, she kisses me again. I feign sleep. Kiss, kiss. I am kind of enjoying this. She never kisses me. I consider myself lucky if I get a strangle-hold hug every few days or so.

I open my eyes. “Tick!” She jumps on my stomach in her triumph. “Tick! Tick!”

“Why! It’s my dream prince!”

And so the Princess is awakened from her fateful coma and the kingdom rejoices, HURRAH!

I ask myself what this bit of playacting means. If it means anything. There are a few possibilities: