Mile-marking: Ivy is 4.75 years old. She’s approaching 60lbs and is as long as train smoke. She is shedding the car seat in favor of a booster seat. Her favorite song is anything from KPop Demon Hunters, but especially ‘Your Idol’ by the demon fellas. She has finally joined the ranks of peanut butter and jelly sandwich consumers, which makes life so much easier, but I’d say her favorite food right now is mac & cheese, though not by much. She is also now an official member of team-glasses due to mom and dad’s weak-ass eye genetics. And some quick-fire anecdotal stuff: lice x2 this year, kindergarten starts next year, now sleeping in a full-sized bed, taking dance lessons, lost her first tooth, and the list goes on. The most prominent shift is that she’s really developing into her own unique person in many ways.

Ivy has experienced a self-discovery which has proven to shape a very large part of her personality. She has discovered intentional sass. Since the age of about two years old, one would have been accurate in describing this little girl as sassy. That, however, was only the sweetly endearing seed of an attitude – almost accidental, as notes of rainforest dew streaming from a fig tree, pooling for the Amazonian fauna to sip. Not that. What I’m talking about is more akin to weaponized plutonium, albeit not always in a bad way, and, in fact, mostly in hilarious ways. Ivy is very good at picking up on mannerisms and tone-of-voice as conveyances of connotation in conversation. She’s a natural mimic.

For instance, whenever (and every goddamn time) I mess something up, my babygirl is right there waiting to chastise. Let’s say we’re having dinner and I accidentally knock my fork onto the floor. Ivy’s response will invariably be unblinking, wide-eyed eye contact, a pronounced lean-in, a head cocked to the side (complete with bouncing curls), and a “Really dad?… Really?” just absolutely dripping with weaponized sass – maybe a couple of upturned palms for added emphasis as well. It makes me laugh every single time. On the flipside is certainly not a unique trait. It’s how Ivy becomes a different person when tired and cranky. Her personality becomes almost completely anchored in stubbornness, often working against her own best interest for the sake of contradicting my requests. It’s extremely aggravating but at the same time I find myself thinking “that’s one tough little bitch.”

I think the moment I truly realized how formidable of an opponent I was facing was one night she was really pissed about not getting to play for a longer period of time or not having dessert or someshit, and we put her to bed. She had absolutely no intention of falling asleep and expressed as much to me. She got out of bed immediately and sat in a corner of her room in protest. I scoffed and left her alone, in parting, arrogantly proclaiming “you’re going to get tired of just sitting there doing nothing.” I went about my nightly routine then settled in on the couch to watch some TV with my wife.

Some time passed without a peep from Ivy, and I could not have been more confident that she had cracked and put herself to bed for the night. After about an hour, I went back upstairs to use the bathroom and sensed a subtle movement in the dark chasm of her bedroom. I entered and, like an evil poltergeist, there she sat in that same dark corner, the shine of the nightlight cast a subtle gleam over her glassy eyes as she stared into the abyss. Her arms remained folded as they had been. Her seated position was unchanged. I honestly think she was doing her best not to even blink. Remorsefully, I carried the catatonic lump of my fully awake but dazed daughter to her bed, covering her and kissing her forehead. Wordlessly, she snuggled in for an evening’s rest. As I left her room and quietly closed her door, a gentle, cool gust of wind escaped her room, lightly caressing my ear. I’m 99.95% certain that my daughter was already asleep by then but in my mind, that gentle breeze carried the sweet voice of my daughter upon it – the voice of an exhausted champion – which whispered: “Checkmate motherfucker.”

Whether the sass is light and funny or wielded as instrument of chaos, the fact that Ivy is aware of it and deploys it with intent (frequently) makes it core to who she is as a person. It’s weird to think of her as her own person – separate from her mom and I – but undeniably often we look at each other and say, “she didn’t get that from me.” Barbs like calling me a bagel-sandwich-head are easy to etymologize back to the think-tank that is her peers at daycare, but when she sees me drinking my morning coffee and shakes her head, saying “Dad, you’re so predictable,” I’m at a loss for an understanding of where she heard it and how she learned the proper usage context.

There are a million of those little Ivy-isms and I’m thankful for her mom keeping track of some of them, but even more-so, I’m thankful for how often I get to look at my daughter, shake my head and think (or say), “What a ridiculous little person.”

One thing that has been a revelation to me is liking my daughter as a person being a separate feeling from loving her as a daughter. She’s caring and enthusiastic like her mother and can be chill and thoughtful like me. And she’s so damned funny. I’m fortunate to have a fair amount of really good female friends, the closest of which I tend to give the title of and endearingly refer to as ‘the homie.’ These are the gals whom, if I’m ever in their respective towns, I’ll make time and effort to visit for a meal or drink to catch up, and with whom time apart never diminishes the depth of our connection. From the moment Ivy was born she had won my everlasting, unconditional love. No matter what she does for the rest of my lifetime, I will do my best to make her feel loved and supported. It is my duty as a dad, and while I was unprepared for how wholly I could love another human, I did anticipate perpetual, unconditional love to be a given. What I hadn’t accounted for was how cool I’d think she is, or how much I’d admire her zeal, courage and tenderness. I didn’t realize I’d be gaining a new friend. I didn’t anticipate Ivy being ‘the homie.’

Verdict: Incomplete (but pretty awesome so far)