Why Can't I Tap Dance On The Table?

My child has tiptoed across the line into the phase where he will go back to the thing he was just told not to touch, climb into the object he was removed from a minute ago, and resume hurling the ball he was just told to roll on the floor so as not to break any of mommy’s few remaining un-broken possessions. Really. And people honestly believe that humans are inherently good? As soon as my back is turned my toddler turns into a Mister-Sneaky-Pants.

It is the as-long-as-mommy-can’t-see-me-I-can’t-get-in-trouble mentality. Even though a mother knows to expect these things, it still garners a certain amount of disappointment when the said time arrives. Like the first time your child tells you “no”; or hears you say “no” and does whatever it was he wanted to do anyway.

Never mind trying to explain to the child that “mommy tells you ‘no’ because she doesn’t want you to hurt yourself”. That sort of reasoning only begets a blank stare, and when mommy’s back is turned the tot continues in the dangerous occupation and breaks his leg. Endeavor to recap the explanation after the accident happens and the mommy is likely to elicit the same blank stare.

My husband, God love him, has so very many talents and interests. Unfortunately, common sense is not one of them so I fear my children have a fifty-fifty chance at continuing on in their present bewilderment as to why certain things are unacceptable and, even, what those certain things are in the first place.

Some days I find it rather tricky to keep my sense of humor when having to repeat the same admonishments over and over and over and over again. It really can be quite tiresome. There have even been phrases I have had to speak that had never occurred to me prior to being a mommy. “Don’t sit on your sister’s head,” for example, or “Do not drink the water in the bathtub- you just peed in it!” Ah, well. I suppose common sense can be overrated.