Hey, thanks for all the comments. I'm loving the blog renaissance!
It has been the ugliest fall here in Bham. It has rained and rained and rained. Out in the back yard where Tom was once building the canal, we now have a muddy rock pile rising from a puddle. I would imagine that this frustrates him, but we haven't talked much about it.
Last Monday was an early release day from school. I hate early release days. Not because I dislike having the kids home. On the contrary! But having them home every odd once in a while just for the afternoon means that they want to plan something out of the ordinary, and that inevitably involves extra kids and quite a lot of bother of one sort and another. This particular Monday, it also involved our old dead lawnmower, now bereft of blade, and the muddy rock pile/puddle. Also jumper cables (fortunately no one was blinded) and quite a lot of whooping. And truckloads of mud.
I know, I know, you're wondering, "Julia! Where were YOU???" Well, I was here. Mostly. It just didn't seem like the stunningly bad idea it turned out to be until the moment that I realized that (unlike me) the boys saw the old lawnmower less as a great learning experience in the shop and more as a poor man's four wheeler. When I heard the mower roar to life, I ran out to the garage to congratulate them. For a moment, I basked in the joy of knowing what a great, broad minded mother I am.
Then I turned into a shrill, narrow minded, screaming mother. "STOP! NO!!! GET HIM OFF OF THERE!! NO WHEELIES!!! ONLY ONE PERSON!!! I REALLY DON'T THINK..... ZAAAAAACH!!!!! HEY!!! WHATEVER YOUR NAME IS!!! COULD YOU JUST! YIKES!!!! TIME OUT FOR THE MOWER.....HEY! BOYS!!! NOT THE SKATEBOARD!!"
"What, John? A tow rope? Like for a... No honey, no tow ropes."
"I don't mean we don't HAVE a tow rope. I mean YOU can't have a tow rope."
"I mean, no tow ropes on the mower. Look boys, think about this picture. A rope tied to the lawn mower. People running around. Ropes twisting around limbs and necks. Ropes dragging people. Ropes cutting things off. Important things like heads, arms, and legs. "
"Look, boys, I totally get that you are VERY responsible and..."
"I never questioned your judgment, but..."
"BOYS!!! NO TOW ROPES!!! NO, NOT FOR THE BIKE!!! OR FOR ANY VEHICLE OR REASON!!!"
"AAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!!! GET THAT THING OUT OF SIXTH GEAR!!! DO YOU HAVE A SPEEDOMETER?"
My friend Teri's advice to her boys is, "If it looks stupid, sounds stupid, or smells stupid, it IS stupid." I don't know how she successfully raised two boys with this piece of advice, because frankly, NO idea which has just occurred to a boy strikes him as stupid. Ever.
And later, after it has been proven stupid, the idiot antics still have to be shared. My boys can't resist telling me all the horrifyingly stupid things they do. They just can't. It's great to pull it off without getting caught, but within 60 minutes, they find themselves sidling up to me and asking, "Mom, if I tell you something, promise you won't get mad?"
I love my boys, I DO, I DO!! But don't tell me I have my hands full. Everybody does. Do they think I don't understand this? I am in a boat with six adorable males. The boat is filling with water. I'm frantically bailing, yelling for help. The boys are looking at me. They're all wearing the same perplexed look and they're asking, "Why is water (mud, a party for sixty, hooky-bobbing, etc., etc.) a problem?"
9 comments:
It's hard to say anything, since I obviously of the same state of mind as your kids. Great post, though. And tell me, just what purpose was the canal going to serve?
I totally have the mental image of this scene at the Mumford home. If you ask me, I think boys are weird. I've always thought that. They always seem to come up with these strange ideas (Charlie included) - I probably think this since I didn't have any brothers growing up! Love the post, Julia... C
As a boy at heart, I smile to myself and love the stories. As a doc-to-be, I'm cringing and thinking about the severed fingers/concussions/life-long injuries we see in the ER. Obviously, though, no boys are born with a sense of what is stupid, so I suppose it doesn't matter what we think...
Oh, and hooky bobbing is wicked awesome. I think Uncle John once drove us along at about 35MPH on one memorable Christmas tree pickup.
national geographic says that the rational decision making part of the brain doesn't firm up until age 25. That's why my decisions are so rational this year!
I LOVE reading your blog, cause I laugh out loud EVERY TIME! I just set up mine, check it out if you wish. It's a nice way to keep in touch hey!
Cousin Holly
That sounds like when Ryan and the kids hooked all the swings together with millions of bungee cords and were about to hang someone by pushing them off the ledge into space when I discovered them.
Very funny. As one of the people who made the bungee cord contraption in my mom's comment, I am here to defend it. Actually It was basicaly a saftey contraption that kept us from falling off the swings while doing our flips. Mom merely misinterprited the whole ruse and got us in trouble. And FYI check out my blog. the true story of the bungee cord contraption is coming.
o and fyi this is Emily
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