Sensitive Girl

Olivia is passionate about a lot of things and has very little tolerance of mean people, bad things and tragic events (and the music associated with them) she saw in the movies until after she was five. She practically never finished any of her movies until then.

When she was really young, she would yell for me to turn off the TV whenever the bad character came on board or the music started to change the tone. She is very emotional and sensitive, like her mother and all her aunties but more so.

I remember one of my brother-in-laws told me one time that he knew exactly when to turn to his wife in the middle of a movie and would find her moved into tears. Still that does not prepare me to see my little girl doing the same thing watching a DVD when she was only two and half. I was shocked.

Can not remember every single time it happened but do remember the followings:

1] Watching “Spirit” (believe this was the first time)

I do not often sit down and watch movies with my kids but I did for Spirit because I am a fan of Matt Damon and was curious how his voice would fit into a Disney cartoon.

When Spirit was caught by the bad people, the movie showed him being trapped in a train and saw his mom while he was looking outside. His mom whinnied while she was chasing after the train looking very sad. I turned to Olivia who was sitting on the sofa and my heart just stopped. This little girl sitting there who was only two and half, her eyes were red, tears quietly run down her cheeks. She felt so sad that Spirit was taken away from his mom.

2] Watching “To Live” and 中国式离婚” 

Both me and my husband consider “To Live” as one of the best movies we have seen. So we watched it again a couple of years ago when it was shown on HBO.

Olivia was playing around the house and at one point she decided to stop and watch it with us. The funny thing about her is that she does not understand Chinese but she has no problem sitting down and watching a Chinese/Korean/Japanese show for half an hour. She will just watch and ask me questions whenever she feels like she can not follow.

Shortly after she started watching, the son of 葛优’s character died in an accident. They showed that shocking and deeply sad look on葛优’s face, the mom and everyone else was crying including our Olivia. She was older this time and already knew I would expect to see her cry in a scene like this. She turned her head away while she quickly blinked her watery eyes. Then turned back to me trying to put on a smile “I am not crying”, but the voice was all choked up. Same thing happened when she saw the death of the grandma at the end of 中国式离婚” (no, she did not watch the show).

Whenever I see Olivia moved into tears by a movie or show, I always give her a kiss and a big hug and somewhere in my heart felt so close to my little girl.