The Ferrett (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} theferrett) wrote,@ 2008-05-11 14:50:00 |
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Yeah, You Knew It Was Coming
"Unca Ferrett?" said the little girl at one in the morning, hovering nervously by my couch. "I had a dream about a doggie and it was on fire and now I can't sleep."
I can't say I hadn't expected this. Four-year-old Carolyn was spending the night so her mommy and daddy could have an evening to themselves (and so we could be wrapped in Carolyn cuddles), and she usually didn't sleep well in strange places. She'd had a dream about a doggie the last time, too, and so I hugged her tight and told her that no doggies were on fire.
She looked at me now. "What do we do now? I'm not tired."
And she wasn't. I could see it in her eyes. The four hours of sleep she'd gotten apparently had been enough - though I might lull her into more of it. Knowing that I still had hours of work before me - it was a late night - I said, "Do you want to watch a movie?"
"Yuh," she said. We checked out our vast supply of DVDs, and found that Aladdin had "a big kitty that was too scary" and Finding Nemo had a scary shark and the Muppet Movie had "a car that gets bumped" that was apparently terrifying, and no movie we had wouldn't be fearful. And so twenty minutes passed as we checked out movies, but Carolyn was still awake.
"Why don't we play a game?" I said, and we did, throwing some dice around as we played a crude game of "war." Then we played a little pretend, and got some milk, and ran around for a bit. Then, still awake at two in the morning, she looked up at me and said, "What do we do now?"
And I didn't know. I had no clue. I have daughters, but I inherited them at the ancient age of six. By the time I got to them, all the hard work was done, and they were pretty much self-entertaining when they needed to be. I had a kid who clearly should be asleep and yet wasn't asleep and I had run out of ways to entertain her.
So I did the unthinkable: I woke up Gini, apologizing all the while. "What do I do?" I whispered.
Gini, half-slumbering, had more authority than I'd had fully awake. She looked at Carolyn and the way she was standing and said, "Do you need to poop?" Carolyn nodded and trotted off to the bathroom, and she snapped crisply at me: "Step one: Empty the child."
Then she looked at Carolyn and said, "Right. You. Off to bed." Carolyn protested. "But I'm not tired!" She cried, and came running to me, but I deferred to the true master, and Gini shuffled Carolyn off to the room. She laid Carolyn down, and read her a story, and talked with her about doggies as they hugged in the bed, and within half an hour they had fallen asleep - Gini much more fitfully, but she had quieted Carolyn and Knew What To Do.
That's the magic of mommyhood. When I'm clueless, the mommies know what to do. They know children so intimately they can decide, correctly, that a child is tired even though they say they aren't and swear they're not and act like they're not. It's amazing. They just know.
Look, I like kids. And as long as the kids have ideas, I'm golden. But there comes a point where the kids get bored or cranky, and then Gini does the heavy lifting. I've seen her occupy a bored three-year-old for half an hour with nothing more than a ketchup bottle and a container of sugar packets. She made up that dice game that I played earlier to entertain Carolyn. She knows how to turn shrieking sobs of frustration into more-acceptable sniffles and less hurt feelings.
That's the brilliance of it. Gini's good at mothering, but so are mothers. Being an only child, that's a mystery I've never fathomed. Kids are an alien mindset to me, so close to adulthood but sometimes so distant, and Gini knows how to talk to them in ways that don't confuse them or diminish them. She just does.
And that's amazing.
So congratulations, all you mothers. It's the grunt work you do that you're being celebrated for today - the thousand little ways you know your children, the invisible ways you monitor their moods and build their egos and push them, one faint step at a time, towards competence and adulthood. That's the most complicated job in the whole world, because you often get your best feedback a decade too late... And you manage.
Here's to you.
"Unca Ferrett?" said the little girl at one in the morning, hovering nervously by my couch. "I had a dream about a doggie and it was on fire and now I can't sleep."
I can't say I hadn't expected this. Four-year-old Carolyn was spending the night so her mommy and daddy could have an evening to themselves (and so we could be wrapped in Carolyn cuddles), and she usually didn't sleep well in strange places. She'd had a dream about a doggie the last time, too, and so I hugged her tight and told her that no doggies were on fire.
She looked at me now. "What do we do now? I'm not tired."
And she wasn't. I could see it in her eyes. The four hours of sleep she'd gotten apparently had been enough - though I might lull her into more of it. Knowing that I still had hours of work before me - it was a late night - I said, "Do you want to watch a movie?"
"Yuh," she said. We checked out our vast supply of DVDs, and found that Aladdin had "a big kitty that was too scary" and Finding Nemo had a scary shark and the Muppet Movie had "a car that gets bumped" that was apparently terrifying, and no movie we had wouldn't be fearful. And so twenty minutes passed as we checked out movies, but Carolyn was still awake.
"Why don't we play a game?" I said, and we did, throwing some dice around as we played a crude game of "war." Then we played a little pretend, and got some milk, and ran around for a bit. Then, still awake at two in the morning, she looked up at me and said, "What do we do now?"
And I didn't know. I had no clue. I have daughters, but I inherited them at the ancient age of six. By the time I got to them, all the hard work was done, and they were pretty much self-entertaining when they needed to be. I had a kid who clearly should be asleep and yet wasn't asleep and I had run out of ways to entertain her.
So I did the unthinkable: I woke up Gini, apologizing all the while. "What do I do?" I whispered.
Gini, half-slumbering, had more authority than I'd had fully awake. She looked at Carolyn and the way she was standing and said, "Do you need to poop?" Carolyn nodded and trotted off to the bathroom, and she snapped crisply at me: "Step one: Empty the child."
Then she looked at Carolyn and said, "Right. You. Off to bed." Carolyn protested. "But I'm not tired!" She cried, and came running to me, but I deferred to the true master, and Gini shuffled Carolyn off to the room. She laid Carolyn down, and read her a story, and talked with her about doggies as they hugged in the bed, and within half an hour they had fallen asleep - Gini much more fitfully, but she had quieted Carolyn and Knew What To Do.
That's the magic of mommyhood. When I'm clueless, the mommies know what to do. They know children so intimately they can decide, correctly, that a child is tired even though they say they aren't and swear they're not and act like they're not. It's amazing. They just know.
Look, I like kids. And as long as the kids have ideas, I'm golden. But there comes a point where the kids get bored or cranky, and then Gini does the heavy lifting. I've seen her occupy a bored three-year-old for half an hour with nothing more than a ketchup bottle and a container of sugar packets. She made up that dice game that I played earlier to entertain Carolyn. She knows how to turn shrieking sobs of frustration into more-acceptable sniffles and less hurt feelings.
That's the brilliance of it. Gini's good at mothering, but so are mothers. Being an only child, that's a mystery I've never fathomed. Kids are an alien mindset to me, so close to adulthood but sometimes so distant, and Gini knows how to talk to them in ways that don't confuse them or diminish them. She just does.
And that's amazing.
So congratulations, all you mothers. It's the grunt work you do that you're being celebrated for today - the thousand little ways you know your children, the invisible ways you monitor their moods and build their egos and push them, one faint step at a time, towards competence and adulthood. That's the most complicated job in the whole world, because you often get your best feedback a decade too late... And you manage.
Here's to you.
