A Very Valiant Effort

My kids have this idea that the very instant they awaken in the morning, they must eat. If they have to wait five minutes for me to pee, put on some pants, or God forbid sleep an extra ten minutes, they act as if they are going to die. Baby C is the worst.


This morning, T and C awoke pretty late. Around 6:45. I had been sleeping for approximately four hours at that point. C climbed into my bed and started whining, "eat, eat, eat." I ignored him. "Mom, mom, mom!" Now I know you all have been on the receiving side of the endless "moms." But C has his own not-so-pleasant way of saying it. His version is half-goat, half-Massachusetts. "Ma-a-a-a-a-hm" Actually, there's some semi-automatic weaponry in there as well.

So anyway, the "eats" and the "moms" were coming non-stop and all I wanted to do was lie in bed. So I carefully explained to C that T would go get him some cheerios and mommy would go back to sleep. T loved that idea. Anything that puts her in a position of power is good to go. She jumped up and ran downstairs, narrating the whole way.

"I'm going to get C some ceweal. And I'm going to get his bowl. And I not going to spill it. C, COME HEWE. COME ON BUDDY. I'M THE MOMMY. I'm going to give him two dwops of ceweal. C, YOU NEED TO COME DOWNSTAIWS. WIGHT NOW. FOLLOW ME!!!"

He, in the meantime, wanted nothing to do with her. Instead he decided to turn up the effects. He snuggled in close to me, and started patting my arm, saying "mom, mom, mom" the whole time. This went on for a few minutes, until he noticed a freckle on my arm which, the way he picked at it, I'm guessing he thought was an errant cheerio.

Then he went for the full-body effort. He draped his little pee-laden-pull-up body over mine so that his cheek was on mine and his mouth directly on my nose. He started plaintively calling, "mom, mom, eat, eat" hoping that if the words went directly into my body via my nasal cavaties, they would have to be heard.

Then he started to get angry. He moved his body away from me, turned his feet towards me and started kicking my head. "MOM, MOM, MOM." A came into the room right about then. "Mom," he said, "I had a dream about a mockingbird saying 'mom, mom, mom' over and over again."

Breakfast was on the table ten minutes later.