Peaceful Protest

By Friday, June the twenty-third, Clara Grace was becoming very good at communicating with words the things she did and did not want. This was a welcome relief to her parents who had often found themselves completely baffled by their daughter’s enthusiastic gestures, grunts, and cries in past months. On that particular evening, Clara Grace’s daddy had finished lathering her up with soap and then directed, “Okay, sit down in the water so I can get the soap off.” “No!” Clara Grace answered defiantly. “Clara Grace,” her daddy repeated in a firmer tone, “sit down.” “No, no,” his daughter whimpered, “Poopy,” she added and pointed out a floating log which obviously held contradictions for her when presented in the same context as cleaning off in the bathwater.