My Daughter the Negotiator

Our youngest daughter, Aisha, who is 6 years old, is a negotiator. She likes to be in charge and dictate to others the way things are going to be. She has an uncanny knack for cunningly orchestrating things to go her way.

Today Aisha wanted to play a computer game, which Gabriel wanted to watch, but the older kids had the video camera out on the tripod near the computer (as they were editing their most recent stop-motion movie), and so we couldn’t permit Gabriel to be there because he is too prone to messing with things and breaking them.

So Jim told Aisha that she either needed to play something else with Gabriel in a different room, or she would have to exclude him from the computer game.

She looked at Jim and said with a questioning look, “Exclude?” to which Jim replied, “Yes, exclude, meaning he will have to play something else while you play the computer game.”

So right away she said, “Okay!”, and then hopped down, ran out, showed Gabriel her Barbie dolls, and said, “Here Gabriel, play with my Barbies.”

Gabriel, overjoyed at this prospect (since they are usually off limits to him), easily complied, “Okay!”

Then Aisha ran back into the room, sat in front of the computer game and said, “Ok Daddy, I sclooded Gabriel.”