from the mouths of babes........gumballs and more

a year or so ago, while at macy's with my daughter and her then five-year-old little girl, babygirl decided that she wanted bubblegum from the giant gumball machine in the children's clothing department - however, as is usually the case, neither her mother nor i thought we had any change at all - but finally we found one single quarter - ONE - and babygirl wanted a RED gumball and RED ONLY so she was going to need more than one quarter obviously as the huge machine was full of all different colors - thousands of gumballs and only ONE CHANCE at a RED one - well, you know, when you're five years old, having a RED GUMBALL is a really really big deal - it was for me at five, anyway, and so, too, it was for babygirl - so there we were - one quarter and thousands of gumballs away from a red one - my daughter continued to prepare babygirl for the inevitability of a green one or a blue or yellow or orange gumball, which only served to upset babygirl more - it was then time for YAYA INTERVENTION - so, i told babygirl that all she had to do was to focus on a red gumball if she really really wanted one - she had to look into the exit cup and see one single red gumball first in line to pop out when her quarter struck - i reminded her that yaya had never told her anything that wasn't true or possible - and asked her to believe to know that yaya was telling THE TRUTH now - and that she could have that red gumball if she just believed and, moreover, if she KNEW she was getting the red one - she had to KNOW not just believe - and there IS a difference - so she stood still for a moment, looked at the outlet cup and said "red gumball, come on out" as she inserted her one little quarter - and then, before she could catch it, there onto the floor bounced a RED GUMBALL - which she promptly grabbed, blew off, and popped into her little mouth -

[the image is not the exact machine, but similar - our gumball machine held about 5,000 one-inch gumballs and it was full!]