My beading rate yo-yoes a lot but this summer, my needle went through few thousand beads to make necklaces and earrings under the watchful eyes of my 6 years old niece. She was mesmerized and keen to have a go, not with a kids' beading kit, but with real tiny glass seed beads ... mine!
So, Aida -my niece- and I, were sitting at the kitchen table -her watching, me beading- when my mother, a woman with a cautionary tale about everything, decided to seat Aida and tell her about the "danger" of beads ... (not the "Addiction" danger, me, the aunty is suffering from!)
Aida stared intensely as my mum proceeded to explain to her that years ago, back when we leaved in Mali, the son of her boss was playing with beads and got a bead in one of his nostrils where it went to get lodged into a breathing airways, in one of his lungs. The boy had to be airlifted from Bamako to a hospital in Abidjan and my mum maintained intense eye contact with Aida as she went on explaining that the plane had to fly at low altitude as there was lot of concerns for the boy's breathing if the aircraft had flown higher. The boy was taken care of and saved in Abidjan.
End of the story. Silence. Aida is staring at my mum as if waiting for the most important information...
My mum, happy to have stunned Aida into a thoughful silence, asked her if she had any question...
Aida goes "Yes... What color was the bead?"
So, Aida -my niece- and I, were sitting at the kitchen table -her watching, me beading- when my mother, a woman with a cautionary tale about everything, decided to seat Aida and tell her about the "danger" of beads ... (not the "Addiction" danger, me, the aunty is suffering from!)
Aida stared intensely as my mum proceeded to explain to her that years ago, back when we leaved in Mali, the son of her boss was playing with beads and got a bead in one of his nostrils where it went to get lodged into a breathing airways, in one of his lungs. The boy had to be airlifted from Bamako to a hospital in Abidjan and my mum maintained intense eye contact with Aida as she went on explaining that the plane had to fly at low altitude as there was lot of concerns for the boy's breathing if the aircraft had flown higher. The boy was taken care of and saved in Abidjan.
End of the story. Silence. Aida is staring at my mum as if waiting for the most important information...
My mum, happy to have stunned Aida into a thoughful silence, asked her if she had any question...
Aida goes "Yes... What color was the bead?"