We just returned from a two week vacation. The first week my daughter and I stayed with a friend of mine from college. We had lots of fun doing “girlie” things and exploring an area of the country that was new to us. The second week my husband joined us for a family vacation. My daughter made a very interesting comment when my husband arrived at the house a few minutes past her bedtime. She wanted to stay up late and spend a few minutes with “both of you”.
Her comment reminded me of a story one of my friends told of her daughter when she was a toddler. My friend and her husband had been away for a couple of weeks on business. When they returned, their youngest daughter did not want to have much to do with them. After a few days she was her normal affectionate self. It finally dawned on my friend that her daughter was “angry” at her parents for being gone.