ambition

One benefit of being a mum with a job is that the example that I set for the kids. Geekygirl has always assumed that when she grows up, she too will have a job. For the longest time she has had one particular career in mind.

Her dream started one Sunday morning while we were eating our ritual "Home baked from Trader Joe's" chocolate croissants. If you have never tired these breakfast delicacies, I highly recommend that you do. We threw them into the shopping cart one day, doubtful that a frozen pastry could conjour up the true deliciousness of a genuine "Pain au chocolat", but once I tasted their puffy, crumbly bittersweet chocolatiness I was transported back in time. They evoked mornings in French campsites, when two little girls would get up early to run to the bakery van, practicing their French by ordering "un Baguette, deux croissant et trois pain au chocolat, s'il vous plait".

One morning, with a mouthful of chocolaty crumbs, Geekygirl asked us "Who makes these? I want a job where I can make these for people". There began her dream of becoming a pastry chef with her own patisserie. Over the past few months it has become quite elaborate. She will have a small shop, which she may or may not live above. Her brother will have a restaurant next door that serves only vegetables, to counteract her sweet offerings. Customers will have to go there first, eat vegetables, and only afterwards will they be allowed a pastry. She will drive to her pastry shop in a yellow "smart car". She will serve dog cookies and dogs will be allowed in (I didn't break the news that the California health code doesn't allow dogs in establishments that serve food). She will be serving these cookies, our house specialty since my trip to the "Sanrio" store in Tokyo, so we had better start negotiating a licencing deal.

As suddenly as it arrived, Geekygirls ambition switched gears. She developed her first cavity, an event perhaps not entirely unrelated to her love of chocolate. Her dentist is a fierce, fabulous woman with a deep compelling voice, a pristine office filled with toys and state of the art electronic entertainment, and a tiny fuzzy, impossibly adorable little dog who sits on the kid's laps. Overnight, Geekygirl decided that she wanted to be a dentist instead of a pastry chef. I'm trying to persuade her to keep the patisserie business too, if only to drum up customers for her dental practice.

What do your kids want to be when they grow up?