Mother magic

i promised, didn't I?

I'll start with the mother-magic and dreams story. Some of the details (the butterfly, for instance) may not be what my friend originally said (actually she couldn't remember what it was), but the gist is the same.

My friend told me that her daughter started having recurring nightmares when she was about seven or eight. One night my friend was comforting the sobbing little girl, and said,

"You know, darling, you don't HAVE to have these dreams. They're YOUR dreams, in YOUR head. You can dream anything you like. The next time that nasty man is chasing you, you just turn around and turn him into a butterfly!"

"OK, Mom," said her daughter, tiredly.

The nightmares apparently stopped, and my friend didn't think about the incident again for many years.

Fast forward to this summer, and my friend was staying with her daughter, who is now a mother herself. The family were sitting around after dinner, and after a while my friend's daughter announced that she was going to bed.

"I think tonight I'll dream about ... hmm, let's see ... the cottage by the lake," she said as she got up to leave the room.

"What do you mean, you'll dream about the cottage?" said my friend. "You can't choose your dreams!"

"Yes, I can," said her daughter.

"Who taught you to do that?" asked my friend.

"You did!" said her daughter.

It turned out that ever since the nightmare incident my friend's daughter has been able to choose what to dream about.

And isn't that a brilliant bit of mother-magic?