My teenager raised her Umbrella to the sky and called “Mary Poppins Me Out of Here!”

We lasted five minutes into a walk before she asked,

“Can we turn around?”

It was raining. That constant drizzle that slowly soaks everything.

I withheld the sigh that wanted to escape, not overly surprised at the request.

We were out here already and I did not want to leave yet.

So I pointed ahead.

“Let’s just go to that tree.”

We made it to the tree.

That’s when she spotted a bigger tree. The kind that makes you think of treehouses and fantasy worlds.

“Look at that tree, Mum!”

So naturally we had to walk to that tree.

By now the drizzle was doing its job. My sneakers were wet. Her crocs were starting to feel… alive again.

I didn’t mention that we had been walking for twenty minutes without anymore complaints. (Score!)

We reached another spot, turned around and started heading back.

That’s when she started to reach her limit again.

She raised her umbrella into the air.

“Mary Poppins me out of here!!”

She yelled it to the sky while still walking.

She kept walking like she hadn’t said anything at all.

A minute later she added,

“Mary Poppins, I do NOT need you! I do not need you to make this umbrella take flight with me and Mum all the way home. I do not need you to do that.”

She very much did want some Mary Poppins magic.

Sadly, the umbrella remained stubbornly unmagical.

We walked back to the car with wet shoes and a bit of laughter.

Turns out the only magic here is imagination.