Pam Halter
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Play it again, Sam
Wednesday, February 20, 2013 by pam

"Again."

"Rewind."

Two of the most dreaded words in our house besides "potty." At least when Anna says them. The bathroom is where I spend half my life because Anna thinks it's just fine to sit on the toilet and take a leisurely 10-20 minutes to pee. Enough of that. But the other two words refer to her VCR and video tapes. We used to have a VCR she could run herself, but they've all changed and she can't figure out the new models. So, I have to rewind her tapes.

Okay, ONE tape.

I say one tape because Anna gets stuck on the same video and will watch it over and over again. This doesn't sound like much, does it? But consider this: we've been on the same Barney video for over a week now. Even if she chooses a different tape and lets it play for a couple of minutes, she always goes back to this particular Barney video.

The whole 5 days we were in Williamsburg. The whole ride there. The whole ride home. The last two days. I'm tempted to hide it, but she'll just pick another one and the whole process starts over again.

We watch The Wizard of Oz every morning. EVERY MORNING. For the last few years.

Is there comfort in repetition? There must be. But it's like Chinese water torture to us. If she would sit quietly and watch, it might not be so bad. But she has to repeat words and lines and she wants us to also repeat them. We can't have a conversation or watch TV or a movie without also having to repeat Barney's words or sing Barney's songs. If we don't, she'll just say it over and over, getting louder with each attempt of ours to ignore her. I often wake up singing a song from Barney. Does anyone really know how ANNOYING Barney can be??

SIGH.

Play it again, Anna.


Comments

pam From At 2/20/2013 6:24:06 AM

A script. That's a perfect way to describe it.

Julie Ann Monzi From Gettysburg At 2/20/2013 6:05:48 AM

Ah, yes. Barney. I know him well. And I know the necessity of having to play along with the show or there are consequences - and they're not pretty. It can get really, really tiring and tedious to have to be part of a script.

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