What is success...when you are 2?
A few weeks ago my son (age 2 & half) introduced my grown up head to a different idea of success. In his little mind a toilet was a white rumbling monster that will eat your bum or anything related to that area. He must have formed that theory one day as he so often saw us sitting on this white monster...making very unmanly noises & sometimes accompanied with expressions of agony. This triggered a survival response of "stay away...this thing has to be dangerous"!
One day at home my son yelled, with a sort of voice where as a parent you have no clue whether that is going to be good or bad news...an almighty outcry to "Daaaaaady....come yook...come yook"...Daaaaaaaaaaaaaadeeeey...Falling over all the scattered toys I make my way to the play room safely without giving myself a hip replacement for my upcoming 35 birthday or braking any toys.
And there he stood, in the middle of the playroom without his diaper pointing at his Lego box...yelling..."i yid it Daddy...I yid it...come yook...come yook. At this point the scene was allot to take. I don't cope well when people are yelling at me so my brain is still reflecting on my absolute success of getting through the toy zone unscathed & responding like a fighter pilot just like any self-respecting dad should. My son is standing without his diaper pointing at the box...my brain in total denial..."come kyoser daddy...yook" Because of my height & the size of the box on the floor I'm too afraid to visually discover what the feint smell is introducing me to...so I fold into a crawl (I still don't know why I did that). As I'm approaching the Lego box slowly my son is ecstatic at this point, jumping up and down...come daddy come...kyoser...you can do it"...as I'm leopard crawling toward the Lego box I'm thinking...((this is something you just don't think about when you hear her yell from the bathroom "there are 2 stripes...there are 2 stripes...honey...we're pregnant!"...& all the friends come over...& you get hammered out of fear of what you don't know...& you go shopping the next morning because I remember one late night over milk & cookies watching discovery channel that baby can come any moment...until our first scan where baby is the size of a pea & you're too afraid to ask anything but you just know it doesn't look like that when it comes out so we have some time))...but a situation like this never crossed my mind!
I have reached the Lego box on my all fours and Lucius yells again..."you see daddy...you see...I yid it I yid it"....and there it was...curled up like a cat struggling for warmth...draped over the best toy in the world...I always thought of Lego as being my best friend...I didn't have many friends & now my best friend is covered in shit.
Let me just please say here...few people in this world can clean things like I can & I revel in this unsocial skill. So my first thought was...how the !@#$% am I going to clean this. Lego has many holes...it's a sophisticated toy and the many holes were full...
My son & I are starring at each other as I realize he is reading my face to determine if we are on the same page here. Through our eye contact & his uninterrupted ecstasy I'm trying to convince myself that it must have taken allot of courage for him to try any human function outside his diaper...(I'm also working on a theory that as Lego helped me deal with many things in my small boy world, maybe Lego gave my son the courage to take the first step in approaching the white monster)...by this time we are both so used to the smell & I'm already at his level...crushing his spirit just felt wrong...so I just said..."you didn't poopoo in your dipy....good job prince..."! as the high 5 fell and he jumped in my lap I realized my mistake...I haven't cleaned his bum yet.....we couldn't be deeper in the shit at that point than we were...& we couldn't waste the moment either...we are sitting in front of a Lego box after all.
We just built with the red blocks that day...!
PS...when I bought the Lego, I imagined all kinds of interaction between us...Lego has truly expanded my imagination!