Little m Long a

I am ever amazed at the resiliency of my children.  God bless them, they keep me strong.

A conversation this morning with Zane (5 years old).

Me:  Hey, Buddy.  We’re going to have to miss your big poetry readings and songs this Friday.

Zane:  Why?

Me:  Well….remember your Uncle Monty called this morning about my mom, your grandmom?

Zane:  Yeah…

Me:  Well, man.  She passed away this morning.  We have to go down to Louisiana.

(Zia chimed in) Dad, I’m sorry about your mom.

Me:  Thanks, Zia.  Me too.

Zane:  Yeah, me too.  Sorry, Dad.  (short pause)  Oh, we need a turkey!

Me:  What?

Zane:  Yeah, whenever someone dies you need to bring food.

Me:  Good point, Zane.  Good point indeed.

My mother passed away this morning.  I’m off to Louisiana to say goodbye to her in a religiously appropriate manner.  Oh, and find a turkey!

People laugh when they see me counting my children in public.  It may even go so far as to perpetuate some of the negative stereotypes many have of men as bungling and inept fathers.  Guys seemingly overwhelmed at the prospect of having to actually spend time with their children.  I don’t really care what they think.  One of my assigned daily jobs is loss prevention.  I’m charged the lives of five wonderful children and my goal each day is to see to it that five wonderful children are safely tucked into their beds at night.

However, I would like to offer that my obsession with counting my children does have it’s benefits.  Advantages if you will.  I was reminded yesterday of Zander’s first haircut.  As is the norm, all five kids and I had piled into the van and headed off to Cookie Cutter Kids.  This place is fantastic!  As soon as you walk into the door you are greeted my an enormous indoor slide and climbing apparatus.  My kids went berserk!

In the back, where the actual work takes place, kids get to choose from a variety of seats (airplane, race car, helicopter, motorcycle, etc.) all facing their very own video screen.  These people have it down to an art.  The kid is totally at ease and could care less what you are doing to their hair.  And as a bonus, you are not so torn between standing at your child’s side and having to coral the others because they are equally as entertained.  All the way around my kids love going to get their hair cut.

Haircut having been completed I began the task of rounding up the kids.   “Let’s go troops!” I said motioning towards the door and the kids, for the most part, gathered and began to file out.  I say for the most part because it’s a little bit like herding cats.  As we start to make our way across the parking lot to the van I begin, “One, two, three, four, five, six?….Hey, wait a minute!   You’re not mine.”

Seems my tone may have been a bit commanding when gathering the troops and this one scared but obedient little boy filed right in with my kids.  I quickly ushered him back into the store to his parents (yeah, plural) who had not even missed him.  So, yeah, I count my kids.  It has it’s advantages.

One, two, three, four…..

Zoë, where’s Zia?

I don’t know?

Here I am.

Five.  Good.  OK Zia, I was just checking.

Two minutes later.

One, two, three…Zander.  Get back here! four…..

Zane.  Have you seen Zoë?

No.

There she is.  Five.

Zella.  Get back over here.  No, Zander.  You need to stay in this area with Zella.  Zoë.  Help Zia.  She’s stuck again.

A woman who had been watching me frantically try to keep my five scurrying dervishes within eyesight amongst the maze of climbing chambers and hordes of other children in the play area finally asked,  “How many are you trying to watch?”

“Five,” I sighed and tried to force a smile.  She just laughed, I think at me, and walked away.

The kids had a relaxing day at the zoo yesterday.  I counted to five…….a lot!  I still have a headache this morning!

Zane is studying the life cycle of the caterpillar this week.  They even have a few caterpillars in the classroom and a couple have already formed a chrysalis.  I asked him what was the difference between a chrysalis and a cocoon.  He said,  “it’s the same–isn’t it?”   “I don’t know, Dude.  Weren’t you paying attention in class when they went over that?  You tell me.  Why are we paying all this money to send you to school if your aren’t going to pay attention in class?” I replied.  (I didn’t know the answer but I felt with some crafty blaming and guilting I could avoid having to expose my inadequacies in the insect world.)  I’ve come to find out that the real difference is that moths form cocoons by wrapping themselves up in their silk prior to making their pupa.  Butterflies don’t.  They have silk they just don’t wrap up like the moths do.  It’s all very complicated stuff and better suited for discussion involving the minute differences between the butterfly and the moth and their respective chrysalis as opposed to cocoon formation as they enter the pupa stage of complete metamorphosis.  And this is not a discussion about the chrysalis so let’s forget I mentioned it and move on, shall we?It’s Sharing Thursday.  Essentially, it’s the kindergarten equivalent of show and tell but with a twist.  Each week Zane is informed on Monday the topic for the upcoming Sharing Thursday.  It’s usually pretty simple stuff:  write a word with a long vowel and silent e and draw a picture, bring your favorite stuffed animal,  draw a picture that shows under, bring in something that can be recycled…..you get the picture.  This week would have been just as easy—for a normal parent.

Our assignment for this week was to bring in a time line of the life of Zane–using no more than five or six pictures.  Like I said, an easy task for a normal parent.  I’ve been called many things in my lifetime, normal does not spring to mind as being one of them.  In the brief span of seven years as self appointed scribe of the family I have no fewer than 9 (NINE) different forms of storage media containing our family photos.  I’ve got pictures on floppy discs, on zip drives, on cds, on mini dvds, on vhs, on mini dvs, on compact flash drives, on memory sticks and yes, even on hard copy photographs.  Some of these I am completely unable to access as the computer technology used for them is now obsolete.  My problem is that the photos are scattered all over the house with no specific order or pattern.  Most of the discs aren’t labeled.  It is a nightmare!

I should have been able to go to a drawer or shelf and pull off in succession the five specific years without a hint of trouble.  In my mind I had envisioned our pictures each Christmas with Santa.  We’ve been using the same Santa at the same mall since Zoë had her first Santa pic.  I thought it would be a pretty cool way to show Zane on a yearly time line and figured it would be pretty simple to organize six years of Santa.  Instead I spent the evening running from the basement to the attic and all points in between to try and locate a suitable set for a representative time line.  It took me nearly four hours–long after the kids were in bed.  I couldn’t find all of the Santa pictures.  Still can’t.  I’ve quit looking.  But not perseverating.

I suppose I should add *organize photographs* to my list of things that need to get done around here.

My son, God bless him, has decided that our archaic and wasteful ways must come to an end.  He feels we have not been good stewards of our resources and has instituted some changes.

Him:  Dad, why don’t we recycle?

Is there ever an acceptable answer for not doing something that will benefit our household, our community or the environment?  Really?  Is because I’m a lazy slob going to cut the mustard here?  What about because our little village does not have a recycling program and we have to haul our recyclables 10 miles to the nearest drop off facility?  No, I’m pretty much stuck.

Me:  You’re absolutely right, Buddy.  We should recycle.

That’s all he needed to hear.  The very next time we took a trip to Lowe’s he was all over the task of selecting bins to start our recycling campaign.  We chose three basic plastic storage containers and he wasted no time labeling them.  Paper, Cans and Plastik.  It was official then.  We now recycle and he is the recycling sheriff.  His job is to police our family’s trash habits and see to it that the proper bins are used for our recycling.  My job is once the bins are full to haul the recyclables the 10 miles to the drop off facility.

One of us has not been doing their job.

Today is our regular trash day.  Would it be so wrong to leave it all at the corner and start over tomorrow?

I’m not here.  Really.

Trust me, my trip fails miserably in comparison to RTK’s vacation in Hawaii.  In fact, why don’t you head over to Rattling the Kettle and see where I’ve gone.

Unbelievable!  Just two days ago every single shoe was in it’s proper place, in it’s proper room, with it’s proper owner.  Just two days ago!  I just spent the last 20 minutes rounding up every shoe from downstairs.  Here they are…..

And, all five children are currently wearing a pair of shoes.  You can only imagine what the rest of my house looks like.  Sorry, no post today.  I’ve got to clean house.  Why don’t you hop on over to Jeremy’s place at Discovering Dad.   Jeremy’s been running a series called Spotlight on Dads and has chosen me as this weeks subject.  Hey,  someone had to slum it up–there’s some seriously, seriously great dads highlighted in the series thus far.  I’m honored to be in their company.

A small front made it’s way through our fair city yesterday.  Nothing significant.  No harsh rains or drastic temperature changes.  Nothing inclement.  Fair winds and warmer weather.  My son bounded through the door, home from his morning kindergarten class and immediately spied the kite.  Why it was there or from where it came I’ve no idea.  He was a man on a mission.  The wind was blowing.  We had a kite.  It needed flying.

To the yard we ran and in no time Spidey (it was a Spiderman Kite) was sailing above us occasionally looping and dipping only to surge back high above.  But not high enough.  I instructed Zane to run inside and get the other spool of twine.  Two hundred fifty feet is fine, for a beginner.  We were seasoned having logged a grand sum of ten minutes.  We were going higher.  In no time he was back and the extra 500 feet was quickly attached to the end of our line.

We watched in awe as the little blue kite sailed higher and higher.  Then, it happened.  Stillness.  Calm.  The wind stopped only for a moment but long enough.  Spidey raced head-first towards the ground, twine trailing behind and inevitably looping branches in it’s path.  The wind kicked back up and Spidey responded climbing back into the sky oblivious to the fact that midway in the tether there was a snag.  Amazingly, the little kite continued its journey upward.

Zia, having been an assistant the entire process began to express concerns about that fact that the kite, though flying, was actually stuck in the tree.  Zane would hear none of this talk and continued his dance manipulating the kite with the occasional tug of the string.  Unfortunately, at this point in their grand adventure, I had to leave to pick up Zoë from school.  Zane and Zia were on their own.  Zane assured me he could handle it.  Zia said nothing but her eyes rolled in disbelief at Zane’s overconfidence.

As I was returning with Zoë, I spied the little kite swinging from the branches of a tree—beyond the road, across the river from our house.  The conversation as relayed by my wife went something like this:

Her:  Guys, are you coming in?
Zane:  Mom, we’re flying the kite!
Zia:  Zane!!!  It’s stuck in the tree!
Zane:  No! No it’s not.  It’s flying.  It’s not stuck.  (hopeful, tugging at the string now completely slack in his hands)

Significantly long pause——-

Zia:  Actually…it is!