There comes a point in every mother-of-a-daughter's life when the little girl you desired becomes a covetous alien rather than the sweet, cuddly child of one's dreams. Every mother hopes that to postpone that inevitable change, but hormones are beyond anyone's control.

Unfortunately in today's media society, the change often comes sooner rather than later. In my case, it really became obvious recently when my nine-year-old daughter came down for breakfast wearing one of my sweaters.

When I looked at her with that you-better-not-have-taken-that-out-of-my-drawer look, she fake-innocently replied: "I found it in my drawer so I figured it was mine." I don't doubt that she found it in her drawer because my cleaning lady isn't Solomon, but the rest of her logic left me baffled.

It's not surprising that she covets some of my clothes. Even though her closets are busting at the seams full of tons outfits, somehow my clothes seem more interesting to her. And while we are not the same size, I know she is already thinking ahead to the days when my cashmere sweaters will be hers. One of her favorite lines is: "when you're dead, I want that (fill in the blank with an item of clothing)."

Part of the problem is that she is the only female child in our family of six. Therefore, she has pretty much laid claim to every last female item in the house in anticipation of my pending death. The crystal, my jewelry, my clothes, my shoes, and anything else that she has rationalized will one day be hers. More than once I have considered hiring body guards just to keep her at bay until I have time to grow old gracefully.

The most worrisome part is that she is not a particularly covetous child. Or at least not yet. Many of my friends have teenagers daughters who cannot be left alone in the house for precisely this reason.

Two years ago, I was at a special event with some friends. All of a sudden I noticed one of my friends look over my shoulder with a look of consternation on her face. "Those are my new shoes!" she said. Since she was talking about shoes I turned around to have a look as well. And there were her new shoes -- shoes she had not yet worn -- walking into the room on the feet of her teenage daughter! And the best part was that her daughter wasn't even being coy. She just thought it was natural.

I realized then and there that that is the normal course of life. When your daughter turns a certain age you have to run for cover with every material thing you love.

No more hanging clothes on hangars. No more folding things nicely and putting them in the drawer. If you have an ounce of self preservation then you better be prepared to sleep with your favorite items under your mattress. Or, there is always Plan B -- 1-800-NOT-OUCH Bodyguards.

I wasn't born yesterday.

I had a life before I became a writer. I was a small town kid from Eastern Canada. I went to university. I liked it so much, I went to university a second time. After that, I had had enough university, so I decided to find a job. I always wanted a job that came with a hard hat and I found one in Hamilton, Ontario. I worked for a steel company where hard hats were a must. The hard also came in use once when I had a bat stuck in my living room.

Unfortunately the thrill of hard hats didn't hold me too long, so I set off to Toronto where I became a public relations professional. Apparently that was going too smoothly, because one day my husband decided it was time I made good on an old promise to move to Israel. It's hard being a person with a sense of integrity at moments like that. In other words, I moved to Israel where we still live today.



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