Bed Time

Jeremiah works two or three evenings a week, leaving the rest of us to enjoy each others' company during those final, exhausting hours of the day without daddy's calm, rational counterbalance...

A few nights ago, after finishing dinner, cleaning up, wrestling various body parts into PJs, warming/cooling/warming milk to the acceptable temperature for Daniel, the kids and I settled on the kitchen floor to drink our milk and read books before bed.

Peter selected his new favorite bed time story Planet Earth, now to gain full appreciation for this book, you will have to read his favorite paragraph...

"In a large storm cloud, as water droplets collide, water becomes electrically charged. Positive charges collect at the top of the cloud and negative charges at the bottom. The negative charge creates a positive charge on the ground surface, which builds until lightning sparks from the cloud to the ground and back again."

this was followed by, "oh wow, so now tell me all about lightning!"

Having been plagued by "mother's guilt" already that day, I decided to invest the one on one attention necessary to communicate to my child how tremendously important he is (and the attention necessary to explain such a topic to my four year old!).

Unfortunately, our youngest child's attention radar was immediately conscious of the shift in his paradigm and the necessity to set things straight. Realizing both my sides were flanked by either sibling, he had no choice but to scale the book separating him from my lap. This of course, infuriated his older brother, whose intellect was tediously being enlightened by our conversation, "you see, well... the atoms,... well atoms are..."

Now Daniel, being quite the strategist, realized the frontal approach, although successful in attaining the desired lap, was not going to stop such an intense discussion, but an over-tired, emotional sister who could care less about lightening was the perfect distraction...

"uh, no, so the water molecules,..." Placing one hand on the page of his sister's book, he grins and waits for the scream and shove. "um, no, not molecules, the..." The shove of course causes a slight tear in the page and increased panic from his sister. "well the drops of water,... they, um" Realizing this is more fun than he thought, Daniel persists, this time laughing, which only adds to his sisters anguish. "and, um, they rub,..." But feeling like our natural science discussion was finally getting somewhere, "oh, yeah, um I don't know how they rub..., well, they're like balls...." I ignore the squeals of "IT not FUNNNNNY Dang-uol!!!" Until the final push/pull/shove which succeeds in removing the entire page and sends his sister into hysterical sobs. "so, um, if they rub,... and then negative energy..." Now, not even the hope of understanding lightening can keep Peter's attention, and he perceives the mortal wound received by the book. "well, a charge really,... and then positive,... well, they're attracted..." He too joins in the hysterical sobbing, and Daniel not wanting to stand out, joins their tears, although without the intensity as he clearly does not understand why they were crying.

With that, the victorious baby had re-centered the universe and would go to bed cuddled safely in his mother's arms without any imposing discussions about nature!