It's true that you really have to be careful what you wish for. When Emma was very young, maybe 2 or 3, she was a little bit of a handful. Precocious, curious, fearless. Carys came shortly thereafter and complicated life even further...she was a master escape-artist, highly sensitive, emotional, and prone to meltdowns of gargantuan proportions. When I found out we would be having baby #3 a mere 10 months after baby #2 showed up, we might have panicked a little. As we adjusted our parenting game plan from a man-to-man to a zone defense, I am going to admit that I might have been praying fervently for a child that was going to be a little more predictable. I might have asked for obedience. I might have even asked for a rule-follower.
Well guess what? God listens. Because I got it. Cooper is a scientific, analytical, black and white little rule-follower. And it is driving me crazy.
Some examples: if you say off-handedly that you plan to leave for the store in ten minutes, that kid is dressed in his jacket and shoes and waiting by the front door in nine. Doesn't that sound awesome? Except that both girls (and even me, sometimes) don't function like that - we're usually ready in 15. And those six minutes that he is waiting by the door become eternally long and his mood begins to darken considerably. By the time I get there, he is CRABBY. I am learning to be less specific about timelines.
If I make one of those idle threats that parents sometimes make, like, "If you don't eat a good enough supper, there's no dessert tonight." I better prepare myself to follow through. If Cooper doesn't THINK he has eaten a 'good enough' supper, he will turn down dessert no matter what, because Mom said it, and he must comply. This is so maddening to me - I usually say these things because getting Carys to eat actual food is like trying to solve climate change. But Cooper takes it to heart, and he will flat refuse to put one bite of dessert in his mouth if he deems his commitment to supper as less than ideal. Even if I say later that he did, in fact, eat enough supper, he will say, "No, I didn't finish, so I shouldn't have dessert." I am learning to say what I mean and mean what I say.
This weekend we went up to Bloomington to watch Emma play basketball. Cooper was supremely difficult the entire weekend. At the hotel he remarked that he was really hungry. We wouldn't have time to go anywhere before Emma's first game so I offered to buy him a sandwich from the hotel lobby. He picked one out and on the way up to the desk I commented to Aaron that $11 was sure a lot for a sandwich. And that was it, he didn't want it anymore. Mom said it was too expensive. It took me almost fifteen minutes to persuade him to eat it, and we were almost late for Emma's game in the process.
Later, he asked for a few dollars to go get a slice of pizza. They were out of pizza. So he put the money back in my purse. Never mind that he was really hungry - he wouldn't buy anything else because he had told me he would buy pizza with it. I authorized pizza. If pizza is gone, we must therefore return the money. Who does that? Seriously, WHAT KID DOES THAT? When I found out about it, I persuaded him to come with me to get something else. He said, "maybe a smoothie?" Lo and behold - smoothies are gone as well. Crap. I tried again: "They have Gatorade...?" No. "Nachos...?" No. He chose to go without. And the hungrier he got, the crabbier he got, so that was super fun.
When we got to the gym the next morning, he asked right away if he could get a smoothie before they ran out. I said, "You bet." I gave each of the kids $4 and they stopped off at the concession stand to get one. We walked into the gym and sat down. Minutes tick by, and no Cooper. Finally, Carys comes running in to tell me that Cooper is refusing to enter the gym because there is a sign on the wall that says "NO FOOD OR DRINK IN THE GYM." Never mind that I am surrounded by people with nachos and pizza and hot dogs and Starbucks and even one lady that I'm pretty sure was drinking a whiskey/coke. Never mind that there are garbage cans all over the place expressly for the purpose of throwing away all the garbage that people are bringing into the gym. Cooper is standing dutifully outside the door, sipping a smoothie by himself. I walked over there to get him. He pointed to the sign and wouldn't move. I tried explaining, I tried persuading. I really wanted him to come sit down with his buddies near us and not be left alone like a parent-less vagabond, but that kid was not moving. Finally, I physically brought him into the gym and over to our seats. Where he proceeded to throw away the entire remains of a four-dollar smoothie because it was against the rules to have it.
This isn't an all-the-time thing, by the way. He's highly selective about where he applies this philosophy, and I'm beginning to think it might be centered on places where he feels he might elicit the biggest response from his mother. He has no problem skipping a homework assignment or two. (He claims he knows all the answers, so it doesn't matter if he actually does it or not.) He could not care less about how often he showers, whether his jeans have holes in them, or what time he needs to be in bed. He DOES care that his math tests are timed (why does it matter how FAST I can do them, as long as I can do them?)
I know that raising kids is no walk in the park, and I'm sure I'm in for some interesting years. Emma is probably doing too much, Carys is probably feeling too much, and I guess Cooper is probably thinking too much. My goal is to get through these next few years without drinking too much.
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