Quit It!

Although the show "Diff'rent Strokes" hadn't been on for years, I still couldn't stop myself from saying, "Whatchoo talkin' 'bout Willis?"

It was an unfortunate habit I had never been able to break.

When Madeleine was very small, I regularly asked her that very question, especially when I couldn't quite make out her toddler-speak. "Whatchoo talkin' 'bout, Willis?" I'd inquire.

One afternoon in the car, David driving, myself in the passenger seat, Maddie said something in her somewhat garbled two-year-old way. So of course I asked her, for probably the thousandth time in her short life, "Whatchoo talkin' 'bout, Willis?"

She repeated her statement. Then she looked at me and screamed, "AND STOP CALLING ME WILLIS!"