Building Friends

Jenny was a little 4 year old girl who loved playing with her friends. She liked the idea of playing with her dolls and even like playing with little cars if she had a friend to play with. She would even play in the dirt with a friend.
One day while her brother and sister were playing soccer outside, she went to play with them. When she went outside they ran to the neighbors to play soccer with them. She was very sad. We had a fence all around the property and she was to young to leave the yard. Her brother and sister were 12 year old twins. They were getting at that age when they did not want to involve their little sister in their games.
She was heart broken and came inside crying. "Mommy, they don't want to play with me."
Looking at her sad face, I took her in my arms and said,"Honey, why don't you play by yourself. You have plenty of toys and things that you can do."
She looked at me with those big green eyes all swollen with tears, "but, but, mommy, I don't have anyone to play with me."
I hugged her tightly and told her, "I have some old sheets that you can play with and cut up to make a tent if you like. Daddy has some old wood outside maybe you can build something? What do you think?"
Her daddy said, "Honey, I have some nails and a hammer, but you must be very careful with them or you could hurt yourself."
Her eyes brightened up, "Daddy, can I build anything I want?"
Her daddy said, "sure honey, you can do anything that your heart desires as long as you are careful."
At that she ran outside, She starting using the hammer, very carefully, she would put a nail in the boards. We watched and her daddy said, "you think I ought to go out and help her?"
I said, "No, she needs to learn to play by herself." It was hard to say, but she needed to learn that you will not always have friends to play with.
As she was hammering away, the children next door ran to the fence to see what all the noise was about. Finally one of the children called out to her, "Jenny, what you doing?"
She said, "I am building something!"
Her brother started laughing and smirking at her said, "What are you building?"
She said, "I don't know."
The other little girl said, "if you don't know what you are building, why are you building it?"
Jenny said, "because my daddy and mommy said I can build anything I want."
The other little girl asked, "Can I help you build whatever you are building?"
Jenny looked around and kept hammering.
Again the little girl asked, "Can I help you?"
Jenny looked up and said, "OK. but you got to be careful with my daddy's hammer."
A little while later the other children joined the adventure of building something. They came inside the yard and started hammering. As we looked at them playing and building, my little girl ran inside the house and asked, "Mommy, can we have some limonaide? Can we have some cookies?"
"Hold on." I said, "Ok, I will make some and you can bring it outside." giving her a tray full of goodies, I said, "Be careful you might spill the limonaide."
With a big smile she ran outside with a tray full of goodies in her hands.
A few minutes later, she ran inside and asked, "Daddy, you got another hammer?"
Her daddy said, "Sure, but you must be careful."
"I will." she said.
"Honey, what are you building?" I asked.
She looked up at me and started giggling but did not say anything.
Again I asked, "Honey, what are you building?"
Looking up at me with those big green eyes, and a big smile, she said, "Friends!" and ran outside.
THE END