The Beautiful Merry-Go-Round of Parenting

It’s just another day. I get home from work and am greeted by the boys. Well, by the two-year-old at least. The baby is napping and three-year-old usually launches into a story about some experience he had during the day before the door is even closed.

After multiple attempts, we get the kids to the dinner table. Eli has developed this incredibly annoying habit of replying, "what happens if I don't?” when asked to do anything. John is in the habit of repeating everything Eli says, albeit with varying levels of success. John doesn't quite grasp the sentence but gets the meaning, so when I tell him to eat his dinner he says, "what if no me do?"  He just turned two and it's already starting.

I have a chat with the boys about back talk and we’re finally eating. I ask Eli, “what'd you do today?” He matter-of-factly says, “We pet cats in the bathroom." Um, what? We don't have any cats.  "Yeah, we just pet them and they had a sink but no toilet." I ask where they were. He says they were in the bathroom with a little bit of attitude like, "why can't you get this, Dad?"

I finally ask my wife what he’s talking about and it turns out they went to the pet store and they pet cats in the "back" room with the sink. He looks at me like, “that’s what I told you.”

After dinner we walk to the nearby school so Eli can ride his bike on the track. After months of frustrating attempts, he’s actually able to pedal the bike. Of course, at the slightest hint of an incline he de-bikes and says he needs to walk the bike over the imaginary hill. We’re not clear of the frustration just yet.

After the bedtime routine they’re finally down for the night.  Ah, post bedtime; that wonderfully tranquil time from 8:30 p.m. to some unspecified time later. But then, sometime between midnight and 5 a.m., our house turns into Jurassic Park. I’m sure this was a hereditary gift from their mother, but these boys make all sorts of strange and sudden sounds at night. John has perfected the late night velociraptor cry (a sudden burst that lasts mere seconds). And Phillip hums away just how I imagine a content triceratops would.

Before I know it, it’s morning. I get up before anyone else and walk across the living room but am startled to see something move out of the corner of my eye under the coffee table. It's Eli, fully awake, and lying there like a Black Ops Agent (if Black Ops guys wore white and red striped footie jammie's. I guess it would depend on the mission…)

He says he's just lying there, being quiet. He’s devastated to hear the news he needs to go back to bed. Whining is not very Black Ops behavior.

And then I’m off to work. That’s a typical day in the life of this parent: I miss out on a lot, get frustrated with the boys in the little time I do have with them, and then struggle to get them to do the things they need to do.

And yet, I look forward to coming home to do it all over again. The beautiful little merry-go-round of parenting continues.