The Great Ries-dini
Tonight Riesling amazed even me, by not only crafting her own magic trick completely from scratch, but also concocting an entire setup story (that even fooled the formerly great dad-dini). During our evening ritual, Riesling announced that she was unable to find her other sock. She dutifully played along as her unsuspecting audience attempted to help her find the “missing” sock.
As I rounded the corner towards the bathroom sockless, I overheard Riesling saying to Gleamer and Cashel, “Oh? What’s this?!”
Riesling then produced the second sock, seemingly from thin air! Everyone was thoroughly amazed, at which time Riesling exclaimed to me, “I did it Dad! I did a magic trick all by myself!”
In genuine disbelief, I said, “Wow! That was amazing! And you even made up a setup story and everything all by yourself.”
I wanted to push back on her a little to see how she would handle it, since at this point I suspected how the trick really worked. I stated that since I had taught Riesling everything she knows about magic, I knew she had just placed the sock up her sleeve or was hiding it somewhere on her body. She said no and quickly made the second sock disappear by leaving our field of view only for a moment. (Note: This slight hiding was necessary because as she explained after to me in private, she did not have time to practice the trick since she just made it up.)
When she returned I pompously stated that I knew the trick and would be inspecting her entire person for secret hidden socks. She graciously obliged but no sock was to be found except for the original lone sock. Moments after my inspection, “Ta Da!”, the second sock had materialized out of thin air for a second time. Flawless execution of the trick had again created a highly believable illusion. I stated to her again that I thought it was a wonderful trick, especially to have been devised on the fly.
Gleamer and Cashel went off to read and bed and I began to brush Riesling’s teeth. She was so excited to tell me about the process of devising the trick that the toothpaste was dribbling out of her mouth. She proceeded to tell me that it was OK for her to share her trick with me because that’s what magicians do and it would be between her and me only.
If you thought I was blown away already with the trick, you were right but she was about to amaze me yet again with her sophisticated understanding of the art of illusion. First, I will not reveal the trick but I will say that she clearly was building off the ideas of several past tricks we have developed, notably the false bottom cardboard box and the nested yogurt containers.
The most amazing thing to me was how she had planned the whole trick out to a tee, including how she would rehide the sock if necessary. She had thought out all the details of the execution and how she would distract the audience’s attention. This is when she described to me her lack of skill executing the reset without drawing attention to the secret, hence her decision to partially hide her actions.
I am not a magician, not even close, but I use magic to teach the kids logical reasoning, creative design and pyschology. We routinely make “magic tricks” from any common household item you could imagine. With both Riesling and Cashel, magic has sparked and fueled their desire to always ask why and to question their assumptions. Magic, together with our explorations into juggling and dancing, has given the kids a chance to also appreciate and understand the skill-level and practice required to create a performance to remember.
Riesling’s performance this evening will remain in my memory for many years to come!
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