Jesus Will Babysit Me

The Little Man never wants to go anywhere.  Every time I tell him we have to go somewhere, he whines, "I'm tiiiiiiired."  I have NO idea where he heard that.  It is certainly not from me.  I am perfect effing super mom.  I function without sleep.  Always.  And everything gets done, too.  Perfectly.  With no sleep.  And no tiredness.  Ever.

All right, fine.  He heard it from me.  He uses it in the correct context, too.  Whenever he doesn't wanna do something, he's tired.  He just wants to relax for ONE.FLIPPING.SECOND!  Child, you are 4.  You sleep 11 hours a night, plus you get a 1- to 2-hour nap during the day.  Do not tell me you are too tired to go on a bike ride or to the grocery store or to the library or to take the recycling.  I GOTTA GET OUTTA THE HOUSE, KID!

So, he's taken to counting down the days until he is allowed to stay home alone.  Age 4 is not that time.  Neither is age 5, as he will find out in a little less than 4 months.  As it is, here is our conversation from Friday morning:

Me:  Little Man, I am preparing you.  After lunch, we are going to the big, giant, awesome library downtown.  There are escalators. (You see what I did there?)
Little Man:  I am not going to the library with you.  I am staying here.
Me:  You are not old enough to stay here by yourself.
Little Man:  Jesus will babysit me.
Me: *dumbfounded*
Little Man:  He knows everything.
Me: *vacant stare*
Little Man:  And you don't.

Even fun stuff, he doesn't want to go.  Dudes!  How can you bribe a kid to get his shoes on post haste so that they can FINALLY go play at the park because it has been a frozen tundra out there for 3 months, and we finally got one warm, sunny (albeit muddy as all get out) day, if they DON'T WANT TO PLAY IN THE PARK?!?!? OMGWTF,T?!?!? He did enjoy the escalators at the library, though, and I did get him to the park where he caked 4 inches of mud onto his school shoes.  There was a 3-year-old girl there, and he ran right up to her and began playing cheerfully.  I wish I could do that sometimes.  I chatted with her dad for a little bit, but he was a bit of a douche, so I stopped.  I had the distinct feeling that he was attempting to make me feel stupid by talking world politics.  He kept talking about his military background or something and then ordering his wife around as she hovered over her little girl.  Probably so that my ruffian didn't knock the little thing over.  He was acting a bit rambunctious, but he wasn't hurting anyone, so I let him play in the mud and jump in puddles and scream his fool head off.  I mean, we were OUTSIDE.  At a PARK.  (I let him do this inside at the Old McDonald's Playplace, too.  It's a kid place.  Deal.) I knew the little girl wasn't in danger, though.  Little Man is extremely careful with children younger than him.  He has a protective instinct.  As it is, I wasn't watching him all that closely, as long as he was in earshot.  I read a book instead.  Or, I tried to read a book.  Military Magoo kept trying to chat me up about potty training or some crap.  "What are you reading?" he says.  "Biography of Hosni Mubarak," I say.  I think "Nothing, right now, assbag, because you are TALKING.TO.ME. I would LIKE to be reading quietly while my kid goes on a rampage and fake shoots every tree in the park with his finger canon. POW! POW! Mubarak was a POW!!!! former fighter pilot POW! who moved up in the YOU'RE DEAD, EVIL TREE! ranks very quickly."

Before my "social training" that thought woulda popped out of my mouth.  It has before.  I hate when people ask what I'm reading.  Because if I'm talking to them, I'm not reading, which is what I would rather be doing.  I can't just stop in the middle of a chapter.  I have to get to a good stopping point.  Which reminds me of elementary/middle school.  I am a very, very fast reader.  When I was younger, I was flying through 2 or 3 preteen novels a day (Sweet Valley FTW).  I would bring one to school with me every day, and I would put it in my lap and put my head down and read it during school.  I figured, I'm good on grades, so I clearly know this stuff, and I want to read, so why not.  I do what I want!  Anyway, teachers, they don't like that.  Well, NOW I know it is disrespectful, but then, I had no idea.  As it was, they would often call on me to answer questions, or just to get me to lift my head, but I couldn't answer.  I knew they were calling on me, but I HAD to get to a good stopping point first.  Many times they would keep saying, "Karen, Karen...hello? Karen!" and I would raise my head up and shout, "I AM READING! I WILL GET TO YOU WHEN I AM FINISHED!"  I remember doing this to a LOT of teachers.  To my knowledge, not a single one of them ever called my parents to let them know of my erratic behavior.  Hmmm.  I'll take "items that fit into the bigger picture" for 1000, Alex.


Oh! Gear switch.  The Big Man hatched chicks in his first grade class.  He has been looking forward to this all year.  They wrote a little journal, and he drew pictures of himself taking care of the eggs.  This is where the cute part of the story ends.  If you don't want to read about horrific acts of death and destruction, skip to the next paragraph.

Ha! I tricked you! This IS the death and destruction paragraph! MMMWWWUUUAHAHAHA!!  Ok, it's not that bad.  Big Man's teacher knew that some of the chicks may hatch on the weekend, so she had set up a video camera to watch the chicks so that if the kids missed the hatching on a Saturday or Sunday, they could come back to school on Monday and watch the hatching.  The problem is, snowstorm of the century hit when the chicks were supposed to hatch, and the kids were off school for the whole week.  In fact, no one could get into the school.  Big Man came home from school on his first day back and exclaims, "Karen, ooooohmigosh, only one chick lived!"  His first grade teacher now has footage of 8 chicks hatching pretty much stillborn and 3 freezing/starving to death.  Big Man is still excited about the boy who lived, though.  He got to hold it.

In funnier news, Little Man said that he is excited that he gets to go to Big Man's school when he gets to be 5 and in kindergarten, because at Big Man's school, he can check out chicks.

I realize that I have loads more stories about Little Man than Big Man, and that makes me sad.  I have a Facebook friend who is a SAHM like me to a little one, and she also has an older kiddo in school.  Before I was a SAHM, I would be all judgy mcjudgison at her all of the time for going on and on and on about the baby and never mentioning the older kid.  Now I realize why.  I am with this little dude alone for 10 hours out of every day, just me and him interacting, or not even interacting, just listening to him being a goober on his own.  Sure, we're busy during the day getting junk done, but there is no one else to distract me from him or him from me.  Once the Big Man gets home from school, it's snack, stop hitting your brother, homework, leave your brother alone while he does his homework, dinner, dear lord, child, PLEASE eat!, calm down time, bedtime routine, FOR THE 30TH TIME, BRUSH YOUR TEETH! bedtime.  And I only get every other weekend with him, too.  Now I realize why I bawled and bawled and bawled the first day we dropped him off at kindergarten.