Ginger Snapped

The Gingerbread boy walks into the kitchen. "I really want to go upstairs to brush my teeth, but I'm too scared," he says. Gingerbread Boy #2 leaves his bowl of unnaturally colored cereal without a word and accompanies his older brother up the stairs. She watches them go, astounded at their brief truce. Here in a simple moment, compassion triumphs over cold cereal. Fear seeks out friend, and the fighting ends for a brief time, all for the want of clean teeth. The power of two. She watches them pad up the steps, and with each step, she sees them turning into gangly boys, then teenagers, then young men; by the time they reach the second floor, they're tax-paying adults. Before long, she thinks, her two will seek out two of their own: two new families, and her family of four will be down to two again. She remembers the night when she and he became we. When a welcome hug gave away a hidden ring box in a pocket, and she couldn't stop smiling. The day she joined ranks...

Sometimes nothing brings joy the way a blank piece of paper does, its creamy whiteness stretching out for what seems eternity, waiting for colors from markers to rain down upon it in lines and dots, swirls and scribbles. What is to be created? Does it matter? They take the colored sharpies in hand and draw at the kitchen table. Markers and a big piece of paper. Magic. She draws girls and boys--girls with triangle dresses, boys with inverted triangle bodies. She draws a playground with swings and teeter-totter, children going down slides, children jumping ropes. She even draws camels at the request of the Gingerbread Man to go along with the stories he tells the gingerbread boys of Ahmad and his whistling camel. The gingerbread boys color in her line drawings, turning pigtails red and green. One draws a piano. The other draws a great pool of blue. She thinks she should do this more often. Big blank sheet of paper. Fresh markers. No expectations. No judgment.