It was Saturday morning and we were getting ready to go to a birthday party. I was putting my makeup on in our bedroom, Aaron was in the shower and Kiera was in the living room playing.
“Mommy! Daddy!” Kiera shrieked. I heard her footsteps as she ran towards our bedroom.
I immediately jumped up and headed in her direction. Her shriek for us was not normal. There was a slight edge of alarm in her voice.
As I met her in the hallway, I heard the sound of the dogs barking in the backyard, putting me on alert.
“What’s wrong, baby?” I asked as I leaned down to check her for signs of injury.
“Someone knocked on our door!” She exclaimed, pointing to the front door. “They knocked on our door and then… then they went through our yard!!” She agitatedly finished.
“You didn’t open the door, did you?” I hastily asked.
“No,” She stated emphatically.
Thankful that she had remembered to not open the door, I quickly stood up and headed to the living room with Kiera following close behind.“I saw him! And after he went out of our yard, he went to the neighbors!” She continued on nervously.
I stepped to the window and peeked out the blinds, checking to see if there was anyone standing on our porch. “Baby, there’s no one here anymore.” I told Kiera trying to calm her down.
“I watched him through here,” She said as she knelt down in front of the window and showed me how she had spied on the man.
Honestly, I was feeling a little nervous. Even though this was all coming from my five-year old, it made me a little uneasy.
I had an image in my head of Kiera staring through the window at a creepy stranger as he fled to the neighbors’ house. I quickly pushed the image out of my head and focused on a more reasonable one, like a door-to-door salesman. It was then that Kiera added a small detail that would have helped settle the matter in the beginning.
“He left our yard and then went to the neighbors,” she repeated then preceded to add, “He looked like he had a mail bag.”
I stepped back from the blinds that I had been peeking through and turned my full attention to my little spy.
“A mail bag?” I repeated. “Honey. That’s our postman. When he closes the lid on the mailbox, it sounds like he is knocking on the door.”
“Ohhhh,” she said, drawing out the word. There was a moment of quiet and then, “Can I get the post?”
Ahh, this child…
Now, first, let me explain the use of the word “post.” This is a direct reflection of Kiera’s lifelong obsession of a British cartoon, Peppa Pig. She still refers to our yard as a ‘garden’ sometimes.
Second, I would like to apologize to our mail carrier for accusing you of being a creepy stranger, stalking through our yard based on the sketchy details from my five-year old super spy.
Here’s to a normal week!
Rowonna McNeely is a graphic artist for Willie’s T’s Screenprint & Embroidery. She is a mother of a five year old girl and step mother of two adult girls. Her crazy life includes a dog, Sloane and psychotic cat, Gracie. Both females. She is married to her prince, who is outnumbered by the opposite gender.
