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November 17, 2004 |
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Littleboyland. It’s a place Jan and I had only visited. Last week we lived there. As the parents of three blondes our life experience was limited to girlville. This is a foreign country to where Grandma and Grandpa spent last week as fill-ins for parents on a cruise. The Killer B’s, Blake age seven and Brett taught us about life in Littleboyland. Oh the things we didn’t know about boys. Like how they lead with their voices. When time hangs heavy, meaning a span of fifteen seconds with no noise, why not break the spell and yell? The best yells aren’t the ones that bother grandma. She just looks up and calmly says, “Let’s use our inside voice.” But the really good screams cause grandpa to rush into the room asking in wide-eyed astonishment, “What happened, who’s hurt, did anyone die?” Little boys think yells that scare grandpa are just a bundle of yuks. But nothing in the world of a four or seven year old male is as hysterically funny as bodily noises. I was up at 6:15 on a school day morning only to discover the grandsons, already awake, next to the refrigerator and into my Diet Dr. Pepper stash. The twosome had collectively discovered the wonderfulness of Diet Dr. Pepper’s high carbonation level and the resulting un-requited joy of chugging copious amounts of the bubbly leading to marvelous wall rattling belches. Nothing says “Good Morning” like a four year old’s big boy burp. The offending party and his brother would then roll on the floor convulsed in laughter over their noisy accomplishment. And if belches are funny you have no idea how high on the hysterical scale a “toot” can register. By the third day of our weeklong guardianship I became convinced any more exposure to the Cartoon Network would cause my skin to break out in a massive rash. To any adult the Cartoon Network has to be the work of the devil. Those under the age of eight find the cable channel high art. According to my untrained eyes and ears it seemed that while the Cartoon Network broadcasts twenty-four hours a day their offerings are limited to three different cartoons two of which deal with Yu-Gi-Oh cards. What’s the deal with Yu-Gi-Oh? Don’t young boys play cops and robbers anymore? I don’t pretend to understand the yin or yang of Yu-Gi-Oh cards other than you can’t take them to school, no one under the age of 8 ever has enough cards and grandparents should, almost daily, take their grandsons to Wal-Mart or Target where Yu-Gi-Oh cards only cost an arm and a leg. I tried to learn about Yu-Gi-Oh. After all they’re so important, the four-year-old sleeps with his cards along with a stuffed Scooby-Do and a blanket. It appears to be Old Maid only with monster characters but as the seven year old detailed in all seriousness “Grandpa “I’d explain a little about Yu-Gi-Oh but grown-ups don’t understand what I’m talking about.” He could not have been more correct. Our girls used to play “Barbie” and let me watch television. Boys insist you be pro-active and play dead. That was my role in the game of “Let’s Play Dinosaur”. I was assigned the continuing role of a “plant-eater”. “Plant-eaters” are killed by the “meat-eaters” (there was an on-going argument as to who was the tyrannosaurus rex and who was the Utah raptor but everyone was in agreement as to Grandpa playing dead and being main course for “meat-eater” dinner). Grandma only got into the act when the four year old asked for the ketchup bottle so he could put pretend blood on Grandpa. Maybe that’s why dinosaurs are extinct. They made the mistake of getting ketchup on Grandma’s carpet. |
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