Raising my son has been a completely different experience than raising my daughter, and he's only six. I know there is much more to come, but so far the differences, at least in my household, have been astounding.
The wildest, most out of character thing Ellie has ever done was when she was three. We happened to have a halogen pole floor lamp in our living room at the time. Ellie climbed onto the edge of the couch and took a flying leap onto the lamp, expecting, I suspect, to slide down it like a fireman slides down a pole in a firehouse. I will never forget the image of her soaring through the air, blonde hair flying back, arms outstretched and knees hitching forward, grasping for the lamp. Nor will I forget the subsequent crashing of the lamp, into the corner, bulb flashing out, lamp busting in half, and the shocked look on her face as she climbed from the rubble. Ellie also went through through a cussing stage when she was three - she's always had a strong vocabulary - but nothing she said then truly shocked me like the lamp incident.
My son, on the other hand, blows my mind on a daily basis. Take last night, for instance. In his bedroom after his bath, Tate began a very inappropriate naked dance, changing the words to a popular song to fit his bodily contortions. I am not comfortable sharing the specific words and gyrations, and unlike Ellie, he's never gone through that cussing phase, so it wasn't awful, but I did let him know that if he tried something like that in school, he could be suspended. And then I turned around to my husband, who also witnessed this fine performance, and shared a look of awe, horror, and slight amusement. Where does he get this stuff?
Tate's also had his own run in with a lamp, which makes me extremely happy I only buy $10 lamps. Tate loves the Indiana Jones movies. One of Indiana Jones's most necessary and reliable props is his whip. The arm of the floor lamp made a great place for my young Indy to swing from with his whip (known to you and me as a Spiderman action figure with a shoe string and plastic web attached). Lamp number two, destroyed.
He's at that age where he's not afraid to be creative. He's not afraid to imagine "What if" situations or think outside the box, like:
Tate: Mommy, what if, there was a bomb, and it created a mushroom cloud on our street, but there was a force field around our house, and around (insert all the names of the neighbors, individually, on our street)'s house, and what if I was outside, when the mushroom cloud came, and I was walking around in my own force field....
Me, interrupting: Like a hamster in a hamster ball?
Tate, continuing: Yeah, and Beau (the neighbor dog), was outside, and he was in a hamster ball force field too?
Me: Well, I guess we'd all be okay then.
Tate: Yeah, it couldn't touch me.
Sometimes, I know exactly where he gets this "stuff," yet Ellie can watch the exact same scene from a movie or listen to a story in a book, and come away with a completely different conversation. Ellie sees the mushroom cloud and asks, "Why?" She wants to know the scientific facts behind what she's experiencing. And if we can't give her an answer, she will look it up. She's logical, which probably explains why she wants to be an archeologist when she grows up. Relentlessly digging for answers, literally.
Logic holds no boundaries for Tate. At times, I am honestly thankful for this; I hope it will serve him well in the future. Our world needs people who can come up with creative ideas to solve problems. Granted, these problems will need to have more depth than, "What if I'm on the Space Shot (a ride at the nearby amusement park that shoots its riders straight up into the air and then drops them quickly back down), and I wet my pants....." Other times, I fear these antics and scenarios will make him wildly popular in college, but not for the reasons that makes a mom proud. In the meantime, I will remember to stay firm with what's appropriate and what's not. I will not laugh (when he can see me) because I know that only encourages his behavior. I will also begin cataloging these stories, because eventually, when I get around to writing books, he will have provided me with some fantastic material.
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