Today in creepy kid wisdom...

I have become increasingly amazed at the introspective power of children in general, but also toddlers in particular.

It's more than that thing that will make a child look at someone with bad acne and say,
"why do you have all those red dots on your face?"

Or size up a person of small stature and inquire,
"So, are you a midget or something?"

I'm talking about when a kid is trying to label and understand the world and they come up with an explanation that is at once S-I-M-P-L-E and COMPLETELY profound. Jake does this over and over again, with such frequency and such little fanfare that I can never even remember the examples or conversations. But I have witnessed him capture the essence of "human fears" and "economics" and "relationships" with dialogue that was not parroting of adult explanations but instead an application of some previously internalized concept to a different or more abstract situation...

Boy: We take good care of our friends right?
Mom: yes!
Boy: And we share with them...
Mom: yes...
Boy: But people we don't know might be our friends?
Mom: yes...
Boy: And we should be nice even if they aren't our friends...
Mom: Yes!
Boy: I would share my snack with anyone that needed it. But if my friends needed more snack, I would have to save some for them and me- and not just strangers...
Mom: well...
Boy: What if people take our stuff and then we can't share with friends
Mom: Um...
Boy: Sometimes people that are mean are just sad...
Mom: huh? (wondering if I ever told him this or if he is coming up with this on his own)
Boy: Like Doc Hudson was in Cars... about his accident...
Mom: (sigh) yes
Boy: He wasn't Lightning's friend, but then he was after...
Mom: Yup.
Boy: Sometimes, it's like everybody is our friend, but also, everybody is not our friend.
Mom: (holy shit!) yes... essentially.

That is a compilation and not an actual conversation, but people wonder why I say things like, "yes... essentially" to my kids. It's because if you are going to give me some Gandhi-esque sound bite, I'm not going to reply, "You're so silly, boo-boo-bear!"

This morning it was a slightly different twist...

First of all, Milo AVOIDED ALL THE PUDDLES IN THE DRIVEWAY!!! Katy and I have been working on this, with (occasionally) painstaking patience. We've tried to teach and show him that there is a time for PUDDLE JUMPING and a time for NOT puddle jumping. This morning, we implored, "Please AVOID the puddles, Milo!" and he did a soft shoe around them walking carefully as if solving a puzzle.

Both moms were thrilled and tripping over ourselves to take credit for teaching him to be this amazing and then we quickly swapped saying, "No, it was you honey... You are the reason he is so wonderful!!!"

At that point while we were giggling with each other near the front of the car, we overheard some absent-minded muttering in the back seat:
Moms: What, Jakey?
J: You know what Syndrome says on the Incredibles?
Moms: No, what?
J: "When everyone is super... no one will be."
Moms: huh?
J: Syndrome says, (with more emphasis on each word) "When everyone is super, no one will be"
Moms: (blinking at each other silently)
T: (to katy) Of 115 minutes of movie, THAT's the line that sticks with him on an average morning on his way to school?!? (laughter)
K: (to me) You're the one that planted your creepy "dark" poignancy in him...

Updates from the home front...

1) Katy got home yesterday! Hooray!!! We missed her but she had a wonderful weekend with her peeps and I had some nice alone time with he boys... I felt good about the weekend. We ate well, and spent nice time with cousins. I showered ALL THREE mornings, and even got to shave ONE leg in the shower. Katy asked me, "What made you TRY to shave in the shower?!?" I told her I wanted to stay pretty for me and also, I like a challenge...

2) JB saw his first movie at a movie theater Sunday with his TT, Uncle Bill, cousins, and me. We saw "Tangled". I loved it. The girl cousins were literally vibrating in their seats in excitement. JB thought the whole thing was a little tired. He was absolutely ambivalent. When Mac called him on Saturday to invite him for Sunday, he (without really even knowing what it meant to "go to a movie," without asking any clarifying questions, and without a pause or any genuine consideration) replied, "No, thanks." He used a tone reserved for someone who is totally satisfied and who is invited to eat one more piece of chocolate- No thanks, I'm good. After we talked about what going to a movie was all about (including details of the treats involved- popcorn, candy, etc) he agreed to go and I advised him he better check to see if the invitation still stood.

The movie was sweet and entertaining, but as all Disney cartoon features, it was fairly adult themed and angst-y. JB feels a lot of feelings and did not like the darkness or the sadness that he sensed. The character of Rapunzel's "adopted" mother was played by Donna Murphy with lines that adults could laugh at- full of understated narcissism and self-esteem crushing abusiveness toward Rapunzel. JB couldn't name what that was, but he was uncomfortable with the introduction of her as a "mother". There were also tons of chasing and fighting scenes and a great deal of stated and perceived "sadness" related to the "missing princess". None of that was lost on JB. He sat with a consternated, furrowed brow for most of the movie and he asked 1/2 way through, "When is this over?"

I pointed him toward the antics of the hero horse, Maximus, and told him how great I thought the music was and we lasted until the end. But when I said, "We should bring Mama back to see this movie, I think she would like it." He replied, "No thanks" in that same, "I'm good" tone.

3) The town pool collapsed a little over two Saturdays ago. ML and I had just began our "Mommy and me" lessons and he seemed to really enjoy it. (As did I.) There has been a lot of drama about this town pool and constant complaints and outcries from people about the failures on many levels. They tried to make it an Indoor and and Outdoor pool with some kind of bubble/ retractable roof... a good idea in theory!

But, this is what the pool looked like the day of our first lesson (I was so excited that I snapped a picture on my phone):



And this is what it looks like now:

I mean, yeah... thank God no one was in there when it happened, right?!?

There is a lot of outrage in the town about it. I really do feel bad for the planners and decision makers. Obviously there wasn't the support to spend the money that they needed to spend for a durable and effective retractable roof. I guess they should have just built an indoor pool, but someone obviously thought it would be good to have a town pool that people could join in the summer.

We've had a championship level swim team in this town since I was a kid and there still isn't the support of the tax payers to give these kids a pool of their own. They have always been at the Y or at the Academy, or borrowing space at other town's pools. It is just too bad. The word on the street is now they have to heat the pool to some degree for the rest of the winter to keep everything from freezing and getting completely damaged. Crazy.

4) Gram went to Florida. For two weeks, with my aunt. This is good for her that she is getting down there and good for us that she is not down there alone or for an extended period of time. Since her stroke in September, she seems almost completely healed. Enough to even take a trip down the hill on our recent sledding expedition:







But that doesn't mean we still aren't worried about her health. I for one nearly pee'd my pants when I saw her on the sled... I was on top of the hill and was like, "WHAT?!? WHO PUT GRAM ON A SLED?!?" She came over dressed for it and had every intention of sledding; without any prompting at all, she put herself on that sled! I was absolutely dying for the 20-40 seconds she was sliding down, but when the sled stopped, (and she hadn't slammed her body into the side of the foundation or broken any bones) I was so thrilled and proud!!! She rocks!

5) One of the more glorious aspects of this winter has been the amazing and spacious 2 car garage that came with our house. There is nothing like pulling out into winter weather with a clean car... the awesomeness is dampened a little by the recent breaking of BOTH of our garage door openers... you win some, you lose some I always say. But thanks to facebook, I've got a friend that "knows a guy", so hopefully, we should be able to fix the situation soon!

Intuititvely obvious life lessons...

1) Sleep makes you feel less tired

Turns out that when you go to bed at 10pm and don't get woken up by a teething, sobbing mammal with a fever in the middle of the night, it makes a BIG difference how you feel in the morning.

For the last several nights, I went to bed around midnight (usually a little later), and WAS woken up somewhere between the hours of 1 and 4am. Consequently, I spent the better part of the last 3 days trying not to spontaneously start whimpering like The Princess Bride's Wesley after enduring the rack.

2) The main job of Children is to collect and spread germs

I know there are a a lot of things that people think Children should be and do-
- Be seen and not heard
- Spread joy
- Pass on your genes
- Scrub this floor until it shines like the top of the Chrystler building
- (and for the RCC) Be protected from the evils of homosexuality... (protected by ??priests??... sidebar... moving on...)

But from an evolutionary standpoint, this is their job for the first few years... to build up an immune system that is capable of fighting off all sorts of bacteria and viruses so that illness won't eliminate them like those visitors from War of the Worlds (Jeeze, I'm really on a movie reference kick this AM).

Between my sister's kids and our kids, one of the 4 has thrown up at least once in the last 5 or 6 weeks. Usually, they seem perfectly happy, then they get green for 48 seconds, look at you and say, "I have to go potty." Then they shoot the contents of their stomach at you in the living room, or where ever is inconvenient. Then after their vague embarrassment passes and the clean up is complete, they resume playing as if nothing happened at all.

Anyway, these kids are not ALWAYS sick so much as sporadically sick, unpredictably healthy, and major CARRIERS of infectious disease. Attempting to quarantine them when they are "sick" is impossible as the cousins would never see each other again. Katy and I have stopped even being phased by runny noses and coughs, but we are still in the mindset of trying to avoid the ever-elusive "stomach bug". The problem is, we do not know when the next puke will come... or from who. And even as seasoned health care professionals, we do not understand the meaning of low grade fevers that come and go for a week or more without any other symptoms.

This is no big deal if I am well-rested. But if I'm particularly exhausted, I start to get paranoid that my tiny children are trying to kill me.

3) Your tiny children are NOT trying to kill you