My daughter was tossing a napkin back and forth between her hands, when my son looked at her and said, “You’re going to drop that.”
She continued her juggling act and replied, “No, I won’t.”
Then my son raised up his hand and swiftly knocked the napkin to the floor and said, “Told ya you’d drop it.”
Today is “Letter Q day” at my son’s preschool. For each letter day, he is supposed to bring in an item which starts with that letter, and he decided he would take a quarter…probably like the rest of the class will.
Lately, he’s been putting his underwear on backward, so this morning when he was getting dressed for school, I asked him to come closer so I could see if he had put them on correctly.
When he was a few feet away and facing me, I said, “Okay. I can tell you have them on the right way.”
He asked, “How do you know? The tag’s in the back.”
I said, “Well, there’s that little…uh…pocket in the front, so I can tell they’re not on backward.”
He looked down and replied, “Oh! I can put my quarter in there!”
My son and I got into a conversation about whether or not he had ever eaten lobster. He said that he’s never had it, when I know in fact, that he has. Most recently, he ate some on New Year’s Eve.
During this disagreement, his speech therapist would’ve shuddered to hear him say, “I not had lobster on New Year’s Eve.”
I corrected him and said, “You shouldn’t say, you not had lobster. You should say…you DID NOT have lobster on New Year’s Eve.”
He replied, “See? You said I didn’t have it, so I was right.”
My boy would get out of bed in the morning, and before he would say a word to anyone else, he would greet his ball with a big hug and a jolly, “Ohhhh Wilson!” I’m not sure what this ball was saying to my kid, but apparently he’s quite a comedian. No person, place or thing could make my son laugh like Wilson.
But, not long ago, Wilson really started falling apart. His outer layer was peeling off and I was finding little bits of foam all over the house. I figured it was time to retire him to a top shelf somewhere. Someplace out of reach, but within view. The two of them would have to skip the long walks and holding hands, but they could continue their conversations, and still have some laughs.
I thought this would be traumatic for my son. Wilson had become his best friend and I just knew he wasn’t going to like the idea. So, to ease the pain, I went out and bought a new soccer ball.
Now, I don’t want to generalize and make comments about men or anything, but it was as if my five year old was going through a mid-life crisis. Because, when he saw the new, shiny, white ball…the younger, prettier model…he quickly handed me the beat up version and said, “This is the OLD Wilson. You can throw it in the trash..”
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