Chats with Children Revisited

 

I apologize to whatever readership exists out there for the long absence of posts and stories about the kids and the happenings of the family from my perspective. There are two reasons for this. I wasn’t really home or mentally/emotionally present and I have been spending almost every waking moment for the last 4-5 months eI ither working on producing experimental results in my research or writing up all of my work for the past 3 years.  The first reason is really due to the second reason, but whatever.

If you want to know what you’ve been missing please let me know and I will be more than happy to send you a copy of the 293 page dissertation that I ultimately submitted. It’s great for insomnia.

This morning as Andrew was eating I called out his name. He immediately replied, “right over here,” as if I had been looking for him.

Today Ben came home from school with some great big black marker streaks across his forehead. I asked him what was on his head.

Ben: Black marker.

Me: Why?

Ben: Well my head was cold and I know that black absorbs heat. It really worked too, my head was hot after that!

Me: Who told you black absorbs heat?/

Ben: You did!

Me: Why didn’t you just wear a hat?

Ben: Ummm…

That’s my son. I was so proud of him for experimenting with something he had learned. At the same time I’m a little dubious about the stated results. He was super embarrassed when I started laughing as he told me the story, but I couldn’t help it. I think that I convinced him in the end that I was proud of him for doing that and I that I wanted him to keep testing things he hears.

I can just imagine this second grade teacher walking around and spotting Ben striping his forehead with a sharpie. “What are you doing?” she asks. “Keeping warm! My dad told me about it!” would be his simple reply… oh dear.

This evening we had another experience that reinforced our conviction to keep Katie off of prescription drugs. Katie was driving and as we pulled out of the driveway Kallie called out that she was helping Andrew get his seatbelt on still and wasn’t buckled herself either. Katie says, “Oh yeah!? Well, where do you think you’ll end up if I slam on the brakes?!” and then starts swerving back and forth across the road with Kallie hanging on for dear life in between the captains chairs. When I looked at her in horror and disbelief, she said, “I’d rather us all be laughing than crying!” I have no idea what she meant by that, but her and Ben were still laughing about it 15 minutes down the road. Crazy.