“Abbey has a battle wound,” Jessica said, still sleepy in the early morning darkness.

After a contemplative pause, Abigail replied, “Balla woo.”

“That’s right, a battle wound,” I chipped in from my side of the bed.

“Battle wound!” It often takes Abigail a try or two.

Our little angel has a swollen, black bruise on her forehead, which she acquired by diving headfirst off the jungle gym at the park. Only last week, I was discussing with my mother (that’s grandma, to you) that all these play structures are covered with openings just waiting for a tiny person to step out into empty space. In the case of this particular fall, it was about four and a half feet of empty space, headfirst, onto a chain link climbing net. In the words of our nanny, Kate, she “just dove!” To which Abigail gleefully responded, “Abbey just dove!”

This is one of the ways you can tell she didn’t have a concussion.

Kate was frazzled, and felt very bad, but Jessica and I were both very pleased that she was the one there. She immediately applied ice to her head and called Jessica. She spent the next hour checking her eyes and delaying her nap to make sure all was okay. In fact, as long as Abigail was fine, I frankly prefer not being there. I mean, I don’t want the trauma of watching my daughter fall on her head from a great height. Best leave that to the professionals.

I was feeling a little anxious about what I’d see when I got home, but when I drove up to the house, I was greeted with a smiling, waving little girl who didn’t appear to have any head wounds at all. In fact, the only time she has complained about her head at all was when I took her shirt off before her bath last night. And she often complains about her head when her shirt comes off. Those ears have a tendency to catch.

We’ll chalk this up to a lesson learned, without any real damage done. In other words, the best kind of lesson.