I was hard at work in my office tonight, catching up on tons of stuff that didn’t get done while I played nursemaid to myself and basically milked all the sympathy I could get out of a lousy head cold. I’m feeling much better now, because really, what choice did I have?

But while I worked, I heard strange sounds coming from Carrie’s playroom adjacent to my office. After a lot of grunting and even some self-pep-talk (“Oh, you know you can do it!”) Carrie pushed her way through the door carrying a snare drum. Don’t be alarmed, we actually own a drum set. It wasn’t like she conjured a snare drum in there!

“Where are you taking that?” I asked.

“To the green room,” she answered, her way of indicating my master bedroom.

“Why are you putting a drum in my bedroom?” I asked.

“I’m not. I’m putting all of the drums in the green room.”

Carrie intended to rebuild an entire drum kit in my bedroom. Oh jazz hands. When she asked me to help her, I almost jumped out of my chair to carry the big one because she was really struggling and because she was using full sentences to do it, but then I thought about it carefully. She needs to learn to tackle problems. And I really didn’t want a drum set in my bedroom. I told her I wouldn’t help her because I was working, and if she wanted to move the drums she was going to have to handle it by herself.

So she did.

I taught her that there are limits, and to handle her issues herself. I taught to work hard for something she really wants and to fight harder when it’s tough. All from the comfort of my desk chair. Enjoy the show.

I promise the video doesn’t actually PLAY sideways, I’m not sure what I did wrong here! (I also promise it’s two and a half minutes of a 9-year-old’s drum solo, so you can click out of it after the first minute.)