Grumble, grumble

Aisling feels, perhaps justly, that she spends a lot of her time being bossed around by somebody or other. Mostly by me and her dad, of course, but all too often by her older sister, whom, she bitterly claims, "acts like some SECOND MOM or something."

Today, the girls and I were sitting at the dining room table enjoying a game of Pounce and Aisling was being her ownself, laughing boisterously in a shrieky, high-pitched manner, singing obnoxious snatches of made-up songs, laughing at her own jokes.There's only so much my nerves can stand in the late afternoon, so I was making some sharp remarks along the lines of "Please hush!" and "Aisling, use your INSIDE VOICE!" and "Would you please stop being SO LOUD?!?"

After all my remarks, Meelyn would add, "Yeah!"

Aisling finally looked at the pair of us and said in a resigned and dreary voice, "You know, I guess I am just going to have to get used to the fact that, in this house, I am the walking path and you two are the hikers."

I thought that was pretty funny. But I still made her hush her noisy mouth.