The little mermaid

As a parent, I try to make connections between things Lily and Virginie like and something new and hopefully educational, or at least entertaining.  Lily loves to swim and draw pictures of mermaids and fish and other sea creatures.  She has been introduced to the Disney princesses by other little girls here, though I could have gone on forever without them in our lives.  So making the jump to the Little Mermaid, seemed like a no brainer.  We started out the video together and, though Lily asked lots of questions, some thoughtful and some just inane and exhausting ("He's a man.  What's a man?"  She's underwater?  What's underwater?"), it looked like she was in for a love affair with Ariel and her friends.

And then came the dreaded Ursula, the seahag, the bad guy.  I am not sure how, but Lily has had very little contact with the bad guy, in any story really.  When she does, her reaction is the same, absolute terror and a freak out that ends in tears.  This was no exception.  When Ursula took Ariel's voice as she sent her to woo the prince in three days in silence, I looked over to see Lily recoiling from the scene in front of her.  She kept asking,"Why is she doing that?  Why is she mean?  Is she going to hurt her?"  This device to move on to the love story was a real stumbling block for my little princess and she could barely get past it.

I had to ask myself, how did we miss the bad guy?  When I was a little girl, I always knew the bad guy was lurking.  I was actually terrified of the bad guys and was on the constant look out for one who would certainly appear.  Life was full of bad guys.  I knew this, at least I thought I did, even at four years old.  Was that better?  Expecting bad things to happen or someone to rain on my parade?  Knowing that good people could not exist in a utopia because that was not real.  The bad guys were what made an otherwise perfect world of happiness, smiles, and sunshine, REAL.  Does Lily not live in the real world?  Am I supposed to infuse her life with a little bit of bad guy?  Will it come to her eventually and will she be shocked out of her face and unable to cope when she finally does see something painful in her life?  Now I am the one with all the questions.

And I don't have the answers.  She is a sensitive girl.  I can tell from the things she says when she is sleeping; yes, the girl talks in her sleep, that she knows there is evil out there, but I don't want to force her to see it.  I want her to feel freedom for just a little while longer.  I see the bad guys.  I know they are out there.  I suppose I need to keep vigilant and attentive and let my little mermaid swim freely through life just a little more.  Disney has that good and evil thing down to a science.  All of their movies for kids are set up that way.  I guess we held it at bay for as long as we could and just like evil, it is going to get in somehow.


(c) copyright 2010.  City Mom in the Jungle.