MY daddy was a Frog

It was the Christmas Adam, the day before Christmas Eve. It was cold and snowing, as it had been for the past week. My six year old daughter Samantha was sitting on my lap in the living room next to a roaring fire. I was reading her the story of the Princess and the Frog. My wife was reading a fashion magazine on a chair nearby and the other daughter Caroline was playing with blocks on the carpet.

“It is not true, Daddy, is it?” Samantha asked somewhat incredulous as I finished the story.
“Of course it is," I answered. It was my turn to ask, "Do you know why my voice is so croaky?”
“No. But croaky voice does not make you a frog.”
“Of course I am not a frog now. But years ago I was.”
“Mummy, he is joking again isn’t he?”
Mummy took her eyes off the dress she was contemplating herself in. Obviously she had an ear tuned to our conversation. “He was not a frog when I met him,” she consoled our innocent daughter.
I had a ready response, “It was another young girl who picked me up from the bank of the reservoir, gave me one look and said ‘Ooh, how revolting.’ But I accidentally touched her lips as I hopped off and the result is before you in person.”
“But you are not a prince, just an ordinary milkman,” clever Caroline butted in.
“Because the girl whose mouth touched my slimy back was a milkmaid, not a princess,” I replied and added, “She gave me a fleeting look and said, ‘Go away, you are as ugly as the frog. A pretty girl like me deserves a handsome prince.’ I trundled off heartbroken. Thankfully I soon met your mother.”
“I was taken in by his new suit and the curly black hair,” my wife contributed.
“Poor Mom! Now Daddy has no hair and his sweater has holes at the elbows,” the daughters said in unison hugging their mother.

I looked at three of them and wished beggars could be choosers and I had been more patient in picking the woman to be kissed by.