Not So Quiet Time

It's quiet time at our house, but my house is not quiet. Since Ella is usually at school, I had forgotten how much difficulty she has being quiet. She seems physically unable to stop speaking, even when she's alone, and she certainly is unable to whisper. I was downstairs at my desk when I decided her volume had gotten too loud, and so I ran up the stairs to find out what was going on. She was in the spare bedroom, entirely surrounded by doll furniture and teeny little dolls. She was bawling her eyes out. I've learned not to overreact when I see Ella in such a state, because she is so sensitive and even more dramatic. I simply asked her what was bothering her. She replied:

Waaaahh, it's just that sometimes I get so mad at you for no reason. I mean, you don't even do anything and I get mad at you, and then I get more mad because none of this is my fault. I can't help that I get mad. It happens with other people too, like one time Jude said "truck" and I just got mad. Then there was this other time when daddy said "good morning" and I just got so mad because I had just woken up and he was talking to me. Waaah ...

Well, she's my daughter. I explained to her that what she was feeling was completely normal (though I'm not sure that it is), and that it happens to me all of the time. I told her that sometimes all I have to do is look at a person and I get annoyed. I told her about how sometimes I dream that I'm mad at Daniel and as a result, I wake up mad at him. I told her about the time I dreamed that he took all of my clean clothes and dropped them in a muddy pond, and I was irate. That morning when Daniel woke up, he was his usual upbeat, optimistic self, and I was angry at him for something he did in my dream. Poor guy. You just can't win when your dealing with another person's delusions.