Are you all ready to learn a new fact for the day? Ready or
not, here it comes.
Did you know that by seven
years of age, 65 percent of children have had an imaginary friend?
Please don't fact check me too much on that statistic as it
originates from a 2004
study. It was also the very first hit on Google when one types in "percentage
of children with imaginary friend".
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| Who's your friend who likes to play? Bing Bong, Bing Bong! |
As you can likely guess, I'm broaching this topic because
Ellie currently has her very own imaginary friend. However, for most parents,
I'd wager that their child's imaginary friend doesn't result in nearly as much
confusion as it does for Bethany and me. Why is it confusing you ask? Mostly because
Ellie's imaginary friend happens to share a first name with her cousin, Elbert.
Bethany and I have long been aware of the fact that Elbert
is Ellie's best friend in the whole wide world. If we ask her to articulate who
her best friend is, Elbert will be the answer approximately 92% of the time.
The other 8% is a split between Bethany and Ethan. By the way, I will accept
your sympathies seeing as how I don't even get a piddly 0.5%.
If I had to peg down when this all began, I would say we
really just noticed it over the past couple of weeks. However, it's likely that
it may have been happening for quite a while. It's likely that this is a
reaction on the part of Ellie to no longer being an only child and therefore
not receiving as much specialized attention.
In all seriousness, it's actually pretty fun to sit back and
watch the various adventures that Ellie and Imaginary Elbert have each day. For
one, the two love to engage in games of hide-and-seek. Imaginary Elbert will go
and hide while Ellie canvasses the house for him. It's kind of interesting
because even when she's searching for an imaginary person, Ellie's still needs
to improve her hide-and-seek skills.
The "two" also like to spend a healthy amount of
time playing in our subbasement where Ellie has set up a completely functional
society. For example, Imaginary Elbert spends his mornings building tractors at
the tractor factory before heading to his afternoon job of baking cakes. Both
jobs enable him to have the means to purchase food for Ellie and himself. Oh, I
should mention here that Elbert's brother, Edmund is also part of this society.
I'm not sure what he does though.
Oh yes, I can't forget about another of Ellie's activities
with her imaginary cousins. First, some background information for you. We
(very) recently traded in Bethany's aging Mercury Milan on a used Chevy
Traverse with a third row. There was nothing wrong with the Milan. It was just
time for something with a little more room. Anyway, anytime we let Ellie have
the opportunity, she will wander back to the third row, strap herself in, and
proceed to inform us about all of her adventures going on a car ride in the
back seat with her imaginary cousins.
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| I'm pretty sure Imaginary Elbert is on the right and Imaginary Edmund is on the left. |
In case you're confused, allow me to reiterate. Ellie's
cousins are named Elbert and Edmund. She loves Elbert in particular so much
that she has named her imaginary friend after him. Ironically, Imaginary Elbert
also has an imaginary brother, Imaginary Edmund. After going through all of
that, I now feel like I may have gone cross-eyed.
In closing, I know that having an imaginary friend is
normal. However, is it normal for one's imaginary friends to be based on one's
very real cousins? Someone want to tackle that? #DaddyWrite
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