Critters

Yesterday when I got home from work, the squeaker’s grandma was holding him on her lap like a baby. He looked anxious and squeaky.

“Something bit him,” explained his grandma. She pointed to the side of his knee, where there was a raised area the size of a quarter with a little hole in the center. Around the raised area, an area the size of my palm was very red and inflamed.

His grandma told me that the two of them were moving empty boxes in the yard when he stumbled and fell onto one of the boxes. She thought he had scraped his leg, but when she looked more closely, she saw the bite or sting.

The squeaker was not crying. He repeated the story that his grandma had told us, even picking up her intonation. But then he added, “I don’t think it’s a bee sting, though.” His voice trembled a little as he spoke. “I think it would be much worser if it was a bee sting.” Then he paused thoughtfully. “Or maybe it was just a small bee,” he added after a minute.

It made my mama heart ache to see him looking so little anxious, and he clearly was in pain even if he wavered between putting on a brave face and squeaking piteously. He got very alarmed if we tried to touch it or even if we looked too closely at it. But I was pretty impressed at how stalwart he was.

Though we were undecided about dinner, his papa proposed that we get his New Favorite Food – a turkey and cheese sub from “Subways.” That seemed to cheer him up, and by the time they got back home with the subs, he seemed to have forgotten about the bite. One nice thing about the peanut allergy is that we have plenty of epi-pens around if he has an allergic reaction to something like a bee sting. But he seemed fine a short time later.

At bedtime, when we snuggled under the covers, he started to tell me about Disneyworld, which his grandma appears to be trying to sell him on despite my aversion to the place. “There are critters there,” he said. “You can have lunch or breakfast with the critters.”

“What kind of critters are there?” I asked.

“Mickey, Pluto, Donald Duck...”

This morning, I asked his grandma if she had told him about the “critters.” She said no, but that she had read him the description of Disneyworld in her travel book. I puzzled over why the travel book would call the Disney icons “critters” until it dawned on me – he meant characters. When it comes to Disney, they’re both the same, really.

Alligators vs. Dragons

The Squeaker and I had Rice Krispies together this morning. While we were munching away, the Squeaker suddenly observed that "alligators are a lot like dragons."

"Are they? In what ways are they similar?" I asked.

"Well, they are both on their bellies," replied the Squeaker.

"True. And they both have scales?"

"Yes. And they are both fierce," he said with certainty.

"Do you think a dragon is a reptile?" I asked.

The Squeaker looked taken aback. "Mama, dragons are just imaginary," he said gently. Apparently, classifying dragons was going a bit too far.

The Skeptical Squeaker

The squeaker wants to know:

How do animals find water in the desert?

How do giraffes eat thorny leaves? Don't the leaves hurt their mouths?

What do okapis eat?

What do rhinos eat?

Thank goodness for wikipedia.

The squeaker and I also had a conversation about the tooth fairy. I told him that it’s good that he cooperates when I brush his teeth, because it keeps them nice and healthy, and the tooth fairy doesn’t leave as much money for yucky teeth. It is unlike me to invoke imaginary beings or monetary gain to encourage good behavior, but I guess the tooth fairy seems so silly that it seemed harmless.

But apparently, I am raising a mega-skeptic. After I told the squeaker about the tooth fairy, he asked a few questions about the details. Then he said, “Is the tooth fairy real? I don’t think she’s real.”

I was taken aback. I hadn’t peppered my explanation with “maybe” and “could be.” I had just related my own experiences, in which lost teeth were inevitably followed by some cash, usually dropped in my bed while my father pretended to help me look for the money left by the tooth fairy after I complained to him that she hadn't shown up. (Well, I left the part about my dad out.) I didn't think my explanation sounded implausible or suspicious. I would expect some skepticism from an older kid, but a three-year old?

“Anyway,” he continued, “she can’t have my teeth. I need them to eat my favorite things.”

And that was that.

Peace

The summer is slipping away, like summers always do. I don’t know how March and April can creep along so slowly while June and July fly by.

We stayed at the beach for a week with my family. The squeaker actually missed his own bed – the first night or two, he said he wanted to go home. This is very unusual for my little adventurer. But he got comfortable after a few days and didn’t mention home again.

And he liked the ocean very much. He played in the sand, but what he really seemed to enjoy was running around in the surf. He and his cousin chased seagulls and flattened sand castles and watered Nana with their watering cans.

I bought a black maternity suit for the trip, and I didn’t look as much like a little bowling ball as I feared I would. I have about 7 weeks to go at this point. It seems a long way off, but I suppose it really isn’t. I feel a little anxious when I think about the first few weeks with a new baby. I like our quiet, sleep-filled nights, and I don’t do well when sleep-deprived. I also worry that breastfeeding will be a struggle again. I read this article on CNN.com where a woman talked about her breastfeeding experience being among the darkest periods of her life. I would have thought her observations were silly and melodramatic if I didn’t feel the exact same way about my experience. Everything about those early weeks was a struggle for me, and when I look back, I just remember this intense anxiety, exhaustion, and disappointment. It would be nice if things are smoother this time.

Other than that, life has been peacefully ordinary. In fact, I haven’t written much because things have been so very ordinary, and it’s hard for me to elevate the mundane to the clever and witty just for the sake of a blog entry. Doing so feels not only inauthentic, but also self-absorbed, as if every ordinary moment is a springboard for some deep reflection or observations about how precious or clever or perfect or fascinating my kid is. (Of course, he is precious and clever and perfect and fascinating, but that’s beside the point.)