Guess What?
“Guess what?” my five-year-old granddaughter says at the beginning of a story and usually a couple of times in the middle right before she gets to what she deems the really exciting parts. “GG, guess what? We made Tiny Tim the Turtle a swimming pool in his box. I checked on him right before I went to bed, GG, and GG guess what? Timmy was peeing IN his pan of water!”
“No way!” I say as she shakes her head yes way! Her eyes dance as if a million tiny candles were lit behind them.
Austyn can make most anything sound grand. Her brilliant five-year-old secret? She makes it sound that way because it is to her. Unlike the unnamed Economics Professor in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, her question isn’t a boring question waiting on a predictable answer. Her “guess what” is an invitation to join her in wonderland.
“Guess what?” Does it even matter what comes next?
Guess what? We visited Sequoia National Forest and guess what? We reached out and tried to wrap our arms around a giant tree-- hand to hand to hand to hand, and we couldn’t do it. Guess what? There were seven of us and we needed at least ten more! The trees were so enormous, guess what? They looked like props at Disneyland.
Whether you can or can’t guess the answer isn’t the point. The phrase is a rhetorical engine with iridescent wings of gravitas. Whatever happens next is something you want to hear.
I’m not sure when it happens, but I know for sure it does. At some point along the learning curve, guessing becomes super uncool. We’re either supposed to be sure or we’re supposed to be silent. Guessing gets branded as lazy or silly. A shot in the dark gets your hand spanked and learning gets less fun. What’s lost, then, is the innocence of discovery. “Guess what” is an entry portal with an unspoken expiration date, but no one should get too big or too old to imagine.
A couple of weeks ago I sent Austyn (via her mother’s phone) a short video of an enormous caterpillar I discovered in the back yard. It was rolling and inching its way across the concrete from one slope of rich vegetation to another on the other side. I put my index finger down beside it so Austyn could get a sense of how big it was. My phone rang as soon as the video was received. “GG!!” she yelled, “that’s the biggest caterpillar I have ever seen! It’s fatter than your finger and longer, too!”
We talked about it for a bit, then went on to other things. The hairy larva didn’t cross my mind again.
About ten days of “guess whats” later, I’m in the back watering and pulling weeds when I see a gorgeous giant Monarch butterfly. It’s orange and black with spots of cobalt blue and it’s as big around in full wingspread as my fist. I didn’t have my phone near me, but when I saw Austyn at dinner, I said, “Guess what?!” As I described the famously robed butterfly to her, her eyes grew round like silver dollars, her mouth in sync formed a perfect “o.”
Then she broke in as if responsible for a special news report, “GG! Guess what?”
“What?” I said, not having any idea where her innocent mind might run to next.
“GG, I bet it’s the caterpillar all grown up!”
... if I had a vote, guess what? I’d keep “Guess whats” on the shelf.
P.S. Wonder