I Like to Sing and Dance, I Like to Sing and Dance

When I was a little girl I thought that everyone in the world broke out into song except my little sliver. I'm not entirely sure where this idea came from, perhaps from movies like "The Little Mermaid" and "Beauty and the Beast." However I came to such a conclusion it bothered me.

So I took it upon myself to rectify this discrepancy within my life (I was a very dramatic child). On my way home from my neighbors house I would often start singing "skipity doo da, skipity a! My oh my what a wonderful day." Then I'd do a few turns on the road, spin a couple of times and continue on walking.

I knew all the songs to "The Little Mermaid" and would sing them at any time, breaking into song in the bath tub or on the walk up the hill from the bus stop.

I was fairly convince of my innate ability to break champagne glasses. I was a child genius who just hadn't been discovered yet.

I even went so far as to make up my own songs in hopes that the birds would fly down onto my hands and shoulders.

No such luck.

In fact no one around me broke out into song either! My attempts at implementing a tradition I just knew the world was practicing without me failed miserably. Mostly everyone just hollered at me to stop.

Nowadays it's my daughter who does the singing and dancing. At all times of day. In the car when everyone is trying to talk at once (and the radio's going). In the shower, in her bed, in the backyard on the swing. She makes songs up on the spot (a few of which I've been quite impressed with) and insists on throwing "concerts." She belts it out with any CD or radio she can come across... at 4 y/o her favorite radio song went like this, "I decide who I am. I decide who I'll be. No one gets to make my mind up I decide." (oh, dear)

Now she's joined the choir at church (which is saying a lot since she's seven and the youngest of the only 3 children in the choir). She tries to get me to come with her but it's hard to explain to a child that that part of me was fairly throttled as a youngster. So she goes with a friend of ours.

I wonder if she thinks that everyone sings and dances. She does watch a lot of "Cinderella" and "Sleeping Beauty." I should ask her.