And Zen What

Five gets home early on Fridays. It's often a nice, quiet, companionable couple of hours before the other kids get home.

Today Five asked if he could watch "a little TV." Stopping myself in mid-NO! (I was raised by a mother who thought TV in the daytime was the end of civilization as we know it, and I don't necessarily disagree with her, frankly), I thought a minute--oh sure, why not I replied. It's been a long week, and he's been really good about practicing his contractions (Braille has a huge number of them).

He went off to the bathroom for his, um, afternoon constitutional, and I found the remote under the pile of apocalyptic rubble that was hiding it this time, and located the cartoon show I found the least vomitous of the selections (some of these shows just SOUND so awful). It was taking him a while in the bathroom, so I went to investigate.

WHOA!!!!!

There he was, perched precariously--and I do mean precariously--on the TUB. One foot kind of twisted back behind him--IN STOCKING FEET NO LESS, just to add to the slippery factor--and the other splayed way far away on the other edge of the bathtub. Of course, when I opened the door he started, and I almost knocked myself out not screaming.

Yikes!

So of course I went through the litany: WHAT were you THINKING???? WHY did you do that????? You could have fallen and broken your head open!!!!!!!!! Hasn't mama told you NOT to (um, wait a minute--truth to tell, I hadn't ever thought of telling any of the kids not to stand off-center on the edge of the tub in their stocking feet) . . . . to, uh, CLIMB on the tub??? And not to run around in your stocking feet because the tile floor is very very slippery???? Not to mention the tub!!!!

Five murmured--he'd gotten over his shock at my invasion--softly, matter-of-factly, like he was reminind himself to make a note of something, "AKshully, I wasn't running."

WHY DID YOU DO THAT?

"I just wanted to."

There ya go.

I must go find some smelling salts, that stuff all those ladies in nineteenth century novels clearly didn't need as much as I do right now.

It's a wonder anyone ever survives childhood.

Or motherhood, for that matter.