It all started this morning at 7:15 when an overeager little boy roused me from my dream.  Can I play wii yet? he whispered.   No, we are still in bed,  I mumbled from under the pillow.  Why don’t you come and snuggle with us?    Okay…  If I snuggle for 5 minutes can I play wii?   Sometimes I take whatever I can get.

By 8 a.m. my kiddo was throwing the wii remote in frustration, didn’t want breakfast, and it began…the whining.

That laboriously drawn-out, sing-songy drawl proclaiming he is the most neglected, lonely, and toyless child in the entire Western Hemisphere.  Perhaps the entire world.


As if “Santa” hadn’t toiled for months shopping for the most dazzling, stimulating, and entertaining slew of presents to open that chilly Christmas morning a mere week ago.  As if unopened new puzzles, books, video games and Lego boxes were not haphazardly stacked in all corners of his over-stuffed bedroom.  As if there wasn’t a garage bursting with new Razor scooters and basketballs, perfectly good bikes and baseballs begging to be played with.

For three hours I fought the whining.  He wanted to go somewhere.  He wanted to do something.  Somethings that entailed driving across town in traffic and spending money. 

I nearly gave in.  I climbed out of my comfy sweats and into some real clothes, broke out the flat iron and even put on eyeliner and concealer.

My hubby even commented on how nice I looked.  Meanwhile the kiddo continued his whining, following me around the house as his nasally, nasty, kvetching bored into the center of my brain.  That was it.  I marched right back into the bedroom, but my sweatshirt back on and proclaimed that we were not going ANYWHERE.

I was not going to reward miserable, spoiled behavior by giving him exactly what he wanted.

But why did it have to be when I was actually having a decent hair day?

So, since there was nothing to do, not a single toy to play with, I decided to give him something to do.

The frown grew longer, the sighs grew deeper, and the attitued multiplied exponentially.

The wii was taken away for the day.  A meltdown of epic proportions (at least for our house) followed.

After tossing around his stuffed animals while sobbing about the rank injustice in his miserable life he passed out.  And looked like the little angel he is 95% of the time.

Because he is a good kid.  A pretty amazing kid actually.  My job is just too keep him that way.

I woke him at lunchtime.  And somewhere, off in the vaporous clouds of dreamland, he found his smile.

We spent the afternoon doing yard work.  Okay, I spent the afternoon doing yard work while he played contently in his sandbox and occasionally helped me stick some dead branches in the trash.  Politely and with a smile on his face.  He rolled up the 100 foot hose and we sat together in the hammock snacking on some of Grandma’s homemade chocolate covered pretzels.   Being nice and helpful gets rewards.  He’s learning.

And so am I.