What else would it smell like?

So there I am.

Cuddled warm and cozy on my bed, reunited with a pillow I left at a friend’s house a month ago, eyebrow deep in Jen Lancaster’s book “Such a Pretty Fat”….which, is HYsterical, but also makes me feel a tad guilt-ridden because I am not using the gym membership I started in January, which I would totally have canceled but you have to go IN PERSON to do it and if I could “remember” to go to the gym in the first place I wouldn’t be canceling the membership…and I hear the thwap-thwap of teeny feet slapping into the room.

I mentally check out of the book, but continue to hold the reading position to see what she’s going to say.

A hand touches my back.

“Mama, will you tickle me?”

“Tickle you?”

“YEAH!”

“Sure, but you have to crawl up here.”

“M’kay!”

She scrambles up the mattress and shows up in my range of vision, all bright eyes and huge smile, anticipating a romping good tickling.

“Let’s try it a new way.”

“Ok, mama.”

“Lay your head on the pillow.”

She does.

“Pull the blanket up to your chin.”

She does this as well.

“Now, close your eyes.”

“Are we going to tickle?”

“Sure.”

“Cause it feels like a nap.”

Dang. She’s sharp.

“No, no, we’re going to tickle this new way.”

“Hmmm, ok.”

So much suspicion from a four year old seems wrong. Where’s the trust, ya’ll?!

“I’m ready, mama.”

“Ok, we’re going to do a Reiki tickle.”

*chirp chirp*

“We’re going to tickle without touching…with our eyes closed…and our head on the pillow.”

“Are you sure this isn’t a nap?”

“Nope, it’s a tickle.”

Now, for all my devious trickery, it was actually quite successful because the threat of a tickle works almost as fiercely as the actual hands-on method.  Just knowing that I was almost tickling her had all the traditional signs of a good tickling: giggling, gasping and squirming.

Then she flings an arm over and slaps me dead across the face.

Oh. The pretty stars!

“Sorry, mama, you ok?”

“I’m fine…but…you DO KNOW what this means?”

She looks at me all serious, full of possible retribution.

“THIS means it’s time for a REAL tickle!”

And I attack.

The kind of tickle where arms and legs cease to function in any effective anti-tickling method, just flail around helplessly, where the armpit and the top of your head are equally ticklish, when you think you may pee just a little bit.

At one point, her shorts slide down and there’s a little handful of booty squirming around as she screams in glee and horror. Her booty is so small that both cheeks still fit in the palm of my hand and I grab it for a final tickle.

“Stop! STOP! STTTOOOOPPPP!”

We both flop to our backs to breathe after the tickle-fest is over.

“Ewww, smell your hand, Mama.”

I cup my booty-grabbing hand over her face and she screams in hysterical horror.

“MAMA, don’t!”

“What’s it smell like?”

“Like butt-crack in the morning.”