What's Your Name?

Miss C, my lovely daughter, has a lot of questions. She picks just one (for about two weeks) and asks everyone she meets this question. Everyone. Everywhere. Here are a list of her questions in the past:

Do you have a dog?
Do you have a cat?
What is your job?
What is your favorite color?
Do you have kids?

These past few weeks it has been "what's your name?" Wait staff, cashiers, librarians, strangers in the park, and today, a doctor. (Who was slightly offended at the question and told her she could call him Doctor.) Eyeroll. Most people immediately soften, smile, say their name, and then she rolls out hers quickly enough that I get a quizzical look and I translate for them. But what really touches me is how she touches them. Up until that moment we are all following a script.

Can I help you?
What would you like to order today?
Will that be all, mam?
Have a nice day.
Thank you for shopping.

But she is having none of it. She wants to know their name. She wants to know who they are. She wants to make a new friend. Social conventions and cues sometimes escape her. And while that may complicate her life occasionally, it gives her wonderful freedom to be authentic. To be honest. See, unlike me, she is genuinely interested in the person on the other side of the counter. I just want to make my transaction and move along. I'm busy. I'm educated in social conventions. I know the words you are supposed to say; hello, good-bye, how are you, fine thank you, have a nice day. She knows that a) she is a person and b) they are a person. Something we sometimes forget.

I know that the guy who checks us out at the bookstore has two chihuahuas. I know the nurse at our pediatrician's office has three boys. I know that the lady walking in the park is named Summer and her dog is named Windsor and he loves to fetch and swim. I know that Courtney at the grocery store wants teach children, but she is a little afraid of the parents. I know the girl who helped her find the right fashion glasses just got back from Mardi Gras and regrets dyeing her hair purple and pink. I know the look on a police officer's face when she ran up to him in his patrol car on Christmas parade night and said "please be safe, please stay safe." I saw him tear up and heard him say, "that is the sweetest thing anyone has ever said to me."

I know a little more about what really matters than I did yesterday. She is teaching me. She knows what matters. I think she always has.