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| X's and O's and Other Things Worth Fighting For | | Date Created: Jul 17, 2006, 08:35 PM |
I swear this morning was six years ago. We had a crazy day. People came to look at the house at 10 (except they showed up early) and 1:00. The hard part is not getting the boys out of the house, it's keeping the house clean. The simple act of eating lunch or looking for a particular choo choo train creates a radius of mess. And each instance has its own radius, each boy his own radius, making a spirograph of destruction all over this house. With the cooperation of the babysitters and Will's mom, though, we managed through. And without much luck as far as the house hunters went. I spent two hours planning around the first visit which itself took about 2 minutes. But that's the nature of selling a house, and we'll make it through, even if that means the boys forget what vegetables are and the "picnics" on beach towels on the floor replace our family meals at the table.
The boys have reverted to terrible two behavior. Since they only have six days before they hit the thrilling threes I guess they are blowing it all out. I expect a miraculous transformation on Sunday. Potty-trained, good manners, less spilling, less spitting. Well, I guess since it's not MY birthday I should just forget my own wishes and keep praying. Mostly the problem is yelling and fighting. About the most incredibly stupid things. George pushed James right in front of Will who then made George tell James he was sorry and give him a hug. "Give him a big hug," Will said. And George did. "No!" screamed James. "LITTLE hug!" And he was not joking. This morning Will and I ran into their room because the screaming was so loud we knew there had to be a serious problem. How serious we had no idea. James had called George's favorite matchbox-car steamroller "macadoni" (macaroni). "Not macadoni, James! Roller!" with tears streaming down his face. I guess I should be glad the worst thing James can think to call something is macaroni. He certainly didn't learn such clean language from me. James has his brothers' numbers and he is not afraid to use them. He can send John into such spasms at the dinner table that John almost tips over in his chair--the debilitating curse? Calling John a man instead of a "big boy."
Speaking of John's spasms, he also has them if his Pooh Bear blanket is on him "the wrong way" with Pooh on the inside instead of the outside, but it's hard to arrange it this way on top of him lately because he also has to have full access to "my string" which is a nasty piece of the blanket he has stretched out, wet and rolled like a dreadlock, and now chews on during naps and at night. It's disgusting. And he may be losing a touch of his sweetness for anyone other than his string. At some random time today I said, "Come give me a kiss!" and he said, " I don't need a kiss." Such a big boy. George, however, was a tad warmer. When Will got home from work I had music playing and George walked up to Will and said with as much authority as the voice of Smurfette can muster: "Hold me and dance!"
I had a strange and not very comforting glimpse into my future today. The boy before James at swimming lessons was five years old. Very cute, freckles, twinkling eyes. His mother was incredibly nice and I enjoyed talking to her for a little while. She seemed like a really normal person very aware of manners and appropriate behavior. And yet her son really scared me. I wouldn't go so far as to say he was bad. Like I said, he was cute and not malicious or anything. But he was SO LOUD and the mother would say, "Duncan's teaching a lesson, you need to be quiet," but he looked at her as if he could maybe comprehend but could not physically control himself from screaming and yelling "kaboom" or "jump" or "whaaahhhoohhh" or whatever. She finally said, "We're leaving in five minutes." "Ten!" he said. "Five." "No eight!" "Five." "How about six?" And he wasn't joking!!! All I could imagine was all three of my boys in the water, me on the side ready to leave and them laughing at me, splashing water at me and at the other people swimming in the pool, saying, "Ten minutes! Ten!" and me saying "Five!" and them just laughing at me and diving under. The mother finally said, "I'm going to pick a switch!" I hadn't heard that one in a while. She even went out the sliding glass door and picked an olive branch of a switch and waved it at him. "Not very threatening," Duncan said and I had to agree. Her son basically laughed at her. But what was she supposed to do? Jump in the pool in her clothes and drag him out? Spank him? Tell him to get the macaroni out of the pool? She was powerless. It took her ten minutes to leave and so in the end I guess he got exactly what he wanted. I got a ten-minute glimpse of hell. The attempts at negotiation by James, the non-stop screaming of John, the quick escape and macaroni-you attitude of George splashing me and embarrassing me. Just when I thought things were getting easier, that there was a light at the end of the tunnel...If that's the light I must tell myself, "Turn away from the light! Turn away!" What the lesson is besides that...I don't know. Pick bigger switches, never let the boys swim more than one at a time, wear earplugs at all times, don't teach them time more than five-minute increments? Maybe the lesson is that even nice people have bad children and no one will blame me if mine turn out bad. I don't know. No more lessons for tonight. No more thinking at all. Just put the clothes in the dryer, brush my teeth, use my nifty skin-care products, and sink into the pillows... |
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