How do I love thee? Let me miscount the ways.

“One, two, three, five, five, six, seven.”  She counts the 6 acorns in a book, counting some twice, skipping others, reusing the same number, skipping other numbers.  It’s a complete mess.

“Does she have a cognitive problem,” I wonder?  But she counted eleven stars the other night, no hesitation.  An attention span problem?  But it is just six acorns.  Is she just messing with me?

She counts them in Spanish, no problem.  (It’s a Dora book so we do both English and Spanish with some things.)

“Good.  Can you count them in English again.”

She completely messes it up—not because of language—she’s just not being systematic.  She’s double-counting, skipping—things she wasn’t doing in Spanish.

“Okay, Sweetie, I know you can count them in English.  Try that again, but do it right this time.”

She counts them just fine. 

“Good.  I knew you could do that.  But why didn’t you do that before?  Sometimes I think you’re just messing with me….  Are you messing with me?

Smiling, “Sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t.”

“But why would you do that?”

“Because I love you so, so much, Daddy.”