Wednesday, December 07, 2005

Why I Want To Be a Domestic Demi-God When I Grow Up … Oh, Wait, No I Don’t

Reha did a pro bono thing last night, so I was again IN CHARGE. We don’t call it baby sitting, by the way. When I’m in charge of the household matters, I don’t baby sit. I parent. Learned not to call it baby sitting the hard way a LONG time ago, my friends. But that’s a story for another time.

A small confession before I begin: Though I did spend a small bit of time playing Burnout Revenge on the X-Box with Jonah when I got home (very much my style of parenting, thank you very much), I did spend the majority of the evening working my cute butt off.

Everyone in our household except the two younger children wears glasses. Technically, I don’t right now, but that’s because I’m taking a much needed break after the surgery. I have a prescription, just haven’t filled it yet. But I think it might be time for Jonah to be tested, ‘cause it’s possible the boy’s as blind as a baseball bat. (I know that’s not the proper metaphoric cliché, but I liked it anyway.)

I was walking down the hallway with a huge basket of clean laundry that I fully intended to fold and put away. That I haven’t yet isn’t important. Jonah is running STRAIGHT at me, waving a stick and screaming that he’s “The DESTROYER of Worlds!” He’s coming right for me, stick pointed at crotch level. He has to see me, I’m like 12 times larger than he is and carrying more than his body weight in laundry; he’s going to step aside, I thought.

I was wrong.

He plowed right into me. Luckily, his face took most of the blow because I had the laundry basket in front of me, which stopped his forward progress before the stick could impale me. Smack, and he went down on his little butt. Like I said, I’m roughly the size of a mountain in comparison to him. I’m the dang 1975 Pittsburgh Steelers Steel Curtain defensive line.

“Jonah, didn’t you see me there? Are you OK?”

A tiny, but sturdy voice from underneath the laundry basket yelled, “NO, I didn’t see you! And I’m fine.” And he went off to destroy a world or two. No harm, no foul.

Next we have what I refer to as the Incident Wherein I Begin Seriously to Question My Parenting Skills, (IWIBSQMPS, for short, and I-Wib-Sqamps is how we’ve taken to pronouncing it).

Lucas was sitting next to Carrie, who was neglecting her homework and wasting her life on MSN Messenger and I walked over to him and asked him if he had any homework. No response, even though I was mere feet away. And remember, I’m a mountain in comparison to these pipsqueak children we birthed. (Though technically, Reha did all the real birthing work, but I was supportive as hell when I said, PUSH!). So the Mountain spoke again, “Lucas! You have any homework?”

He made a grunting noise. Sounded negative, but how can I be sure? So I grabbed the top of his pointy head and twisted it around so he’s facing me, Mount Deal.

An aside: Before anyone accuses me of child abuse, I’ll just point out that I didn’t twist hard or wrench his head. Though I was lightly grabbing his hair, it wasn’t like I was pulling it, or anything violent, OK, Intarweb? Lay off. We don’t spank at our house. We have Time-Outs that last for days, but not physical violence; we’ve found that we get better results with psychological torture anyway.

Now that I had his undivided attention and I was in full view and about eight inches from his face I said, nice and slowly, “Lucas! Do. You. Have. Any. HOMEWORK?” Not shouting or anything, just enunciating with a teeny bit of force. (And let’s not go into the fact that I reminded myself of my mother. That would be too much for one evening).

He said “No,” flicked the end of my nose, and promptly turned back to Carrie’s IM conversation.

He FLICKED ME! My eleven year old son flicked the tip of my nose in dismissal.

Where did I go wrong, Intarweb? How on earth did my sweet boy, who tells his mother and me that he loves us before he trots off to school every morning, get the temerity to flick me? Boy’s lucky to still be alive, I tell you.

So I don’t think I really have it in me to be a Domestic Demi-god anymore. Not that I was really up for that job. Plus, I scorched the buns while trying to make BBQ sandwiches. See? Broiling is hard. You have to pay way more attention then I’m generally prepared to give to any specific task in the kitchen. Then, there was the incident with the broken mixing bowl, which was a bit of a mystery, frankly.

Highlight of the evening:
I was changing Ellis’ diaper tonight and she says to me, “I have blue eyes!”

“I know, E. They are very pretty blue eyes.”

“Yeah, they are.”

“What color are my eyes, Ellis?”

“Red.”

Commenting is not available in this weblog entry.

Holy Crap! Look at all this STUFF down here. It's awesome!

 

Really, I'm glad you made it down here. Almost no one ever comes down here. I'm like in a freaking dungeon down here. I get lonely. But not you. YOU made it all the way to the end of the page. For this I think I've a little crush on you. I don't know, is "love" to strong a word to use in this situation? Well, if it's not "love," then it's very strong "like." I'm totally in like with you for coming down here. You are awesome. Please love me back! I know, I know, I shouldn't be all needy, it's not attractive at all, but you don't know how it is to be stuck down here. Who scrolls all the way to the end of a page anymore these days? Anyway, thanks for shedding some light down here in the depths. I appreciate it. Shoot me an email and I'll send you a dollar, OK?

©2005-2010 Jon B. Deal All Rights Reserved. All comments belong to the respective commenters.