Important...

“Daddy what are you doing?” Elie asked me. I was sitting at the computer, doing some Gimp-fu on a picture. Just kind of fooling around.

“Just working on a picture,” I said.

“Is it important?”

Now, when did she start asking this kind of question? How do you define important? Does it matter to me? Yep. If that’s the criteria, then it’s important. Does it have any cosmic, eternal significance? Um…

So why’s she asking about the importance of what I’m doing? I turn to talk to her, you know – to tell her that, yes, it’s important to me and I’d like to finish working on it this afternoon and…

She’s holding a game.

So the question is really, “Is that something that really, really matters, or can I interrupt you for a game of Uno or Horse Cards?”

And now I’m impressed and kind of sad. You see, I’m impressed that at 5 Elie understands that sometimes I have to do really important things (yes, things with even eternal significance) and I need some uninterrupted time. And I’m sad because at 5 Elie understands that I sometimes really do have important things to do and that I need uninterrupted time…and it feels like that’s more important than she is.

And she’s patient. Oh, yeah, not always. But to stand there holding that game and asking if I have time for her…well, it’s a little heartbreaking.

So, yeah, we played the game. We watched a couple episodes of Clone Wars together. Eventually I went back to the computer, she played with her sister. But the words echo in my heart.

“Is it important?”