The Cost of Silence

I love playing with my daughter. At four, she’s creative and curious and she never fails to surprise me. We play dress up, tell jokes, perform magic, and cook all sorts of treats in her kitchen. We play outside, with bugs, leaves, the swing set, whatever strikes her at any given moment.

We sing. We laugh. We dance and we tumble. She's a princess, and sure, I’m getting older, but I still make a good steed.

More recently, as she nears five years-old, sometimes, especially after a busy day, she’ll go off in her room, or any room, and things get quiet.

Occasionally, I’ll try to come in and join her only to have her shoo me away, tell me it’s a surprise.

Hmm. What's a surprise? There’s no telling what she’s cooking up, but in these little gaps of silence, I’ll talk to my wife. We catch up on our lives in two-minute intervals—think speed dating for parents. Bella will hum along to herself in the sunroom while I ask my wife about her day. I tell her about mine. Sometimes our twelve-year-old son will join us, and for that short little span, and yeah, I’ll admit, it can be pleasant.

It's surprising how much of a presence a little four-year-old person can be. Though no fault of her own, she’s demanding, a force to be reckoned with. She kind of runs things. So when she's quiet, or off playing by herself, it's nice to have a moment and catch my breath.  

But there is a price to pay.

The silence means Bella is busy. She’s building, creating, constructing, upheaving…

After two, maybe three or four minutes, I get to my feet to go check in on things. Walking in, I stumble over a chair, regain my balance only to slip on the fifty or so crayons splayed across the floor. Stickers adorn the walls, graffiti covers her desk, and as I cut a path through the scatter of bowls, cups, utensils, plastic fruit from her play kitchen, I marvel at the spread: open books, magazines, a pile of discarded dresses, dolls, (is that a popsicle?), stuffed animals, a pack of scantily clad Barbie Dolls. All of this stands between me and my daughter, who is still humming to herself as she uses a marker to draw on her arm.

A tornado of activity, the word “how” forms on my lips before my daughter looks up.

“It’s not ready yet, Daddy.”

I start to ask what is not ready. I think about cleaning up. Then I look back at my daughter, who holds her tattooed arm up triumphantly. “Look, it’s a flower.”

She clutches a marker in her other hand. “It’s beautiful,” I say.

"You want one?"

Another look at the mess. It can wait. I clear a place in the wreckage and sit down beside her. I roll up my sleeve and smile. “Sure.”

 

Hide and Seek....Now Repeat

“You find me and I’ll hide.”

It’s not a question. Or a statement really. Actually, now that I wrote it, it makes no sense at all. But in my house it means that my son is going to hide in the couch and I need to play along.

The key here is not to find the little bugger right away, because where’s the fun in that? Then again, I can’t take too long because well, there’s a little guy in the pillows—I mean behind the curtains, I mean under the table, I mean where is he anyway?  That guy will get antsy.

So it takes just the right amount of finding to go with the hiding. And once I do find him, (or when he busts out and announces, "I found myself!”), well, then it’s time to start all over again. So it's important to drag things out, because games have a way of hanging around our house for a long, long time.

“You find me and I’ll hide.”

And again.

And again.

And again.

Now, I like a good winter activity just about as much as any man can enjoy wandering around his house looking in the oven for his kid. But it does, after a while, get a bit redundant. But then again, sometimes when I’m at work, maybe waiting at the water cooler or walking to the bathroom, there in my mind I see this little blonde head popping out of the cushions with that big, half-moon smile on his face.

“You find me and I’ll hide!”

You bet I will.

Kind of a Jerk...

I love my kid just as any parent should. He’s a charming, good looking guy. He's got a great sense of humor, which uh, I mean, how could he not? Yep, he's a good kid, sometimes, even polite. All in all it seems we’ve done s something right with our little gentleman. 

But sometimes, behind closed doors. Beyond the world of Facebook and it’s perfect little pictures. The little snot can be kind of, uh…jerk.

I know I know, how awful of me to say. But hang on. Hear me out. He’s going on three, and I’m guessing this isn’t exactly ground breaking behavior. Pottery breaking yes, but I don’t think he’s the first toddler to get his diaper in a bunch because he’s up past his bedtime.

I'm just being honest, because the writing is on the wall. Literally, wiped on in a smear of milk as he takes his sippy cup and uses it like a magic marker. 

The guy can be a real jerk sometimes.

Just calling it what it is. Think about it. If I, now forty years old, came over to your house and demanded pretzels and like any good host you offer pretzels but didn’t adhere to my rigid, pretzel prep criteria: letting me stick my grubby little hand in the bag for two fistfuls of broken pretzel pieces. 

Unknowingly, you’ve thrown a kink into the Rain Man—like sequence. So I just flop down on the floor, kicking my legs and exalting my displeasure. Maybe take a swipe at your dog.

You probably wouldn’t invite me back over, huh?

But this is how he reacts. Sometimes. The other day he finished his yogurt and hurled the container at the dogs. Jerk Butt. He knows better, and I told him, in my dad voice—that he is not to throw yogurt containers/dishes/sporks/pumpkins from the table.

The next day, he finished his yogurt, wiped his mouth, and then presented the container to me.

“Here Daddy.”

“Great job, son.”

And that’s how it goes these days. One step forward, one flop and flail back.

Like this morning, when he woke up and reached out to me for a snuggle. He laid his frizzy head on my chest, his little pajama footie feet dangling. Great stuff right there, even if five minutes later, when Mom came around, he told me, "You go away, Daddy."

Jerk.

Oh, see those blocks all stacked up? Not on my watch.

Nice flowers, they look so pretty, crushed in my fist.

I see it took you fifteen minutes to piece together my train tracks. Derailment only takes seconds

Oatmeal? Motor boat time! 

Again, not that my kid is a complete jerk. Just sometimes. But we’re getting there. My wife says that it’s normal. I hope so. Because when he wants to the guy can be a complete charmer. People stop in the grocery store to tell us how well-mannered our child is. I look down, stifle a chuckle.

Yeah, he is.

Gender Bender

I recently read in the news how Target's new gender-neutral sections is causing an uproar. Kids across our country are doomed because they won't know what toys to choose. Adults won't know what toys to buy. Boys will get bras. Girls will get jockstraps. The world as we know it is coming to an unlabeled end.

Like most people I know, I find the whole thing to be kind of funny.

When I was two or three my older sister wanted a little sister but instead had me--a dude. So she dressed me up and named me Debbie. Or Gail. I don’t remember. But I sipped tea and played house and pretty much did as she asked. Maybe that’s why I’m so sensitive and understanding. A perfect man, really. Later I returned the favor by dressing up my little sister in karate outfits adorned with hulking plastic bowie knives or as the mission dictated, a sub-machine gun.

Everyone lived.

Gender neutral kitchen set

These days, My two-and-a-half-year-old boy likes to “cook”. He helps out in the kitchen with the dishes or rinsing off the grapes. Over the summer our neighbor brought over her kitchen set, something that would have been in what was formerly the “Girls” section. It has a stove, and oven, a sink and a refrigerator. Here’s a picture of it--->

It even has plastic fruits and veggies with velcro insides so they can be sliced with a plastic knife. But then, take a look at what I found on the counter.

My son likes both the kitchen and the chainsaw. (He uses it to slice the avocados). Am I shocked? No. Actually I think he's a genius for that chainsaw avocado thing. Besides, I’m told that I used to raid my sisters My Little Pony village with my GI Joes, so I guess this gender bending of the toys runs in the family.

Like when my wife was painting her toenails and my son decided that he wanted to paint his toenails as well. So she did, and now we have a chainsaw-toting, veggie slicing, glittery-toenail toddler running around the house.

And all is well.

If there’s a point to this it's that it doesn’t matter. Kids should be able to play and play freely. There are enough rules in the world already. Relax and let them have fun.