I Hope My Princesses Don't Have to Kiss A Lot o' Frogs...

I pulled into the driveway the other night when out of the corner of my eye I saw something that caught my attention: a large dark pile resting up against the house along the front walkway. "What the hell?" I thought as I rolled into the garage. It looked like a Bull Mastiff decided to empty the contents of its bowels on our walkway. Nice. But closer inspection revealed the turdy-looking lump to be something completely different...a very large frog. Or toad. I'm not sure which. Either way, it was pretty gross; all moist and slimy and bloated. So I did what any responsible father would do. I ran and got my camera so I could gross out the girls in morning. As I squatted down to take this picture, I realized how big this thing was, easily the size of both of my fists. I thought, "If this thing jumps while I'm down here, I'm going to wake up the whole neighborhood with freakish schoolgirl screams." It didn't, thank goodness. In fact, it looked like it just slept there through the whole ordeal, oblivious to my presence. Either that, or it was so big that it just didn't care, figuring if I gave it any trouble that it would merely jump up and eat my face off.

After completing my toad photo shoot (...tilt your head...YES, JUST LIKE THAT...click...the camera loves ya, baby...), I went inside to check on the girls before going to bed. The whole experience brought to mind the fairy tale of The Frog Prince, where the princess kisses the frog and he turns into a prince. YIKES! I couldn't even imagine HOLDING the turd toad much less KISSING the thing. It brought a whole new realm of perspective to the well-known tale.

Then my over-protective daddy mind kicked into gear, wondering how many frogs will hop their way into the girls' lives before they meet their "prince". Hopefully not many. But the thought left me feeling helpless knowing that I won't always be there to protect the hearts of my little girls; that my little girls are growing up faster than I would like and that they would have to go through their own series of relational trials on their path to womanhood. So that night, in my helplessness, I said a little prayer for Kailey and Kyra as I rearranged their covers and tucked them in. I asked that they might grow to become caring, strong, confident and self-assured young women, and that they would know how to effectively handle those frogs. I think much of that is my role as a father and a parent, teaching them and caring for them and reassuring them, preparing them for life, but a little (or a lot of) Divine Guidance never hurts.

All of this from an encounter with a turdy toad on the front stoop. Man, I need to start getting some more sleep.