a week before bella was to begin preschool she said she wanted to make valentines for her teachers. for those who don't live with this girl, valentines are the common world equivalent of a homemade hallmark card.

bella valentines typically involve of a complex formula only fully understood by her. they are diverse in style but do have certain common threads. for instance, rarely are people drawn without a browneye. allow me to swing your attention to exhibit a which i will call the 'grandparent anal valentines debacle' which fostered several silent dinners at my parent's house. given her past record, walt and i were a touch concerned of what might be in store for her new teachers.

you can obviously imagine our anxiety when bella announced her creations were complete. we hesitantly took them from her outstretched hand and eyed them carefully. no anuses, check. no penises, check. no ginas, check. (gina is pronounced like china only with a G and is how bella says the word, yes you guessed it, vagina). relief poured over us. it was important that the teachers' first impression of our child was not a jaded, or real, perception. we felt this was a pivotal component of our eldest girl's success in the classroom.

on the morning of the first day, bella was super adamant that her valentines not be left behind. we assured her multiple times we had them, clapping my hand on the three sheets of paper in my back pocket. once at school it was her single and immediate mission to distribute them to her teachers. i only saw the first of these transactions. she gave it to the smiling educator who leaned down to thank her.

teacher: oh my, isn't this a beautiful picture.

bella: yes it is. it is a person being chased by a shooter.

teacher: oh. well, isn't that ... interesting.

yes it is interesting, but not nearly as interesting as the parallel story of how marty and i became the newest names on missouri's department of family services watch-list fifteen minutes after that exchange took place.

i'm confident we just witnessed the beginning of what is certain to be a rollicking academic career.