Bobby Joe Daddy-O!

Mom mentioned how I got the brain injury that has rendered me unable to see various obvious truths. I thought it might be fun to elaborate on that story. It's a Trevor and Devin story because I will tell it to them one day as a cautionary tale about riding in horse-drawn wagons behind old horses driven by older cousins still not quite old enough to drive.

That cousin was Bobby Joe.

When I was in grade school, I felt overwhelmingly privileged to be one of Bobby Joe's young cousins. I know I was only one of many of Bobby Joe's cousins in Wynona Grade School. We were sort of an elite group, those of us privileged enough to be related to Bobby Joe. I'm not sure why. I think it's because we called him Bobby Joe Daddy-O behind his back, maybe to his face, and Bobby Joe Daddy-O is just cool.

Go ahead. Say it out loud right now. Bobby Joe Daddy-O. It rolls off your tongue. It's fun. It made it fun to be Bobby Joe's cousin in grade school. I'm not entirely sure, but I think everyone in Wynona Grade School thought that Bobby Joe Daddy-O was the coolest guy around.

Anyway.

I was 5 when Bobby Joe showed up at our house with a wagon. I wish I could remember the specifics of that. How the heck did a 15 year old get to our house with a wagon and no horse? He must have had his mom with him. He was there with a wagon because we had a horse. Her name was Pepper. She was old when we got her. Nothing we ever did would make her more than shuffle around the yard. She never ran. She was very predictable that way.

So, we (we meaning not me...I was only 5) hooked Pepper up to Bobby Joe's wagon. Then, Bobby Joe took me and Sindy for a ride. And, what a ride it was.

Sindy got in first (she was 8), then Bobby Joe was in the middle so that he could drive, and I got in last. As soon as we all got seated, Pepper took off like a shot running as fast as she could, and as far as I remember, it was pretty fast! She ran down the sidewalk in front of our house, past Grandma's house, past the house that Joe R. would move into 4 years later, and then she turned a corner. Actually, she must have been on the road, not the sidewalk. She turned a corner down a gravel paved alley. During this wild ride, I imagine that I was terrified. I imagine that Mom, Dad, and Bobby Joe's Mom were equally terrified as they watched that crazy horse run off with their children in a top heavy buggy. I imagine. I don't really remember. Head injuries will do that to you.

The buggy tipped over, and I fell out first. Bobby Joe fell off second (on top of me, if I remember right) and then Sindy fell on top of him.

Very clearly, I remember walking/running back towards my house. Dad was running towards the scene of the crash. I was crying because I was scared. I wasn't hurting. Then, the blood ran into my eyes from the gash on my head, and I began screaming in terror. Dad took me home, and I was nurtured and babied and a nice cool cloth was placed on my head. The scar really isn't too bad, anymore. But, it still itches in the summer.

Bobby Joe sustained a pretty nasty road rash on his forearm. I remember him standing over me, concerned. Good old Bobby Joe Daddy-O.

Sindy was not injured at all. Bobby Joe did a good job cushioning her fall.

Ever since then, as Mom pointed out, very obvious things often elude me. It's embarrassing. The obvious only eludes me long enough for people around me to realize that I'm clueless (except in the case of the picture where the obvious eluded me 20+ years). So embarrassing. It really must be a result of a brain injury sustained in that horse drawn buggy crash of so long ago. I couldn't have been born this way.

The moral of this story, boys: no horse drawn carriages for you until you are at least 15 and able to drive yourselves, thereby terrorizing your own younger cousins.

(In memoriam of Bobby Joe Daddy-O.)

Bedtime

I have been completely and totally lax with Devin and bedtime. It started out innocently enough. It was impossible to put the boys to bed at the same time, and they share a room. I would hold Devin until he fell asleep and then have Daddy carry him to bed around 9.

Slowly, but surely, Devin would fall asleep later and later and later. Eventually, he was falling asleep well past 9 and really be, in general, disobedient.

Daddy has had enough. He made me put him to bed at bedtime tonight. It only took 20 minutes to get him to sleep. Now that he has words, putting him to sleep is simply entertaining. It went something like this.

"Sleep, my bed, all night." (It seemed like a good idea at this time.)
"Mommy bed. MOOMMMYYYY BED!"
"No Mommy, No Mommy, No Mommy."
"No Mommy, No Mommy, No Mommy. Don't want you. Don't want you. Don't want you. Don't want you."
"My Blanket."
"Mommy, Daddy, Mommy, Daddy, Mommy, Daddy."
"Treasure, Treasure, Treasure."
"No Mommy, No Mommy, No Mommy. Don't want you. Don't want you. Don't want you. Don't want you."

You get the picture. It ended with,
"My Eeyore."
Sleep
Sleep
Sleep.

Quietly now, "no mommy."
Sleep
Sleep
Sleep

20 minutes. Not bad.

An Admission

I have to make an admission. I was 32 or so when I finally asked mom why she sent me to school with mismatched barrettes and the not-so-stylish 'do. The look she gave me made me think she was thinking how I'd gotten a brain injury that would allow me to be so naive on topics such as these.

"I didn't fix your hair that way, Tricia."

"Well, who?" I think I may have asked.

Hard stare.

"OH!"

Enlightenment. It was me. I fixed my hair myself. I may have even squirreled those mismatched barrettes away in my apple pockets. (Isn't that a cute outfit? Mom made it, I'm pretty sure.)

So, I would like to transfer my angst over this picture to my teacher. If it was you, Mrs. Salami, who let me sit for a photo with silly hair, I expected more! However, if it was, Ms. Riggs; par for the course, really.

So, why did I do this to mom? I wanted her to leave a comment. So, leave a comment, mom!!

***

Boy Stories:
Trevor is teaching Devin to talk.

"Are you taking me to Motorola today, Mom?" Trevor asked.
"mumuumumu Mo-orola today, mommy? Devin asked.

When I dropped them off, Devin cried. He didn't want me to leave. But, then his teacher asked if he wanted to go see Trevor. He willingly left my arms to go to her so that he could go see "Treasure". Despite the fact that Trevor hits and chokes and won't share with his brother about 25% of the time they are together, Devin adores Trevor above all others. I hope Trevor understands someday the responsibility he has towards his brother. I hope that Trevor learns to adore Devin as much as Devin adores him. They'll be a great team when that happens.

And this last bit is so insignificant, it's probably that brain injury mom wondered about a few years ago that makes me want to mention it.

I dropped a bucket of yogurt this morning and said Uh-oh. Little Devin said, "What happened?" So. Stinking. Cute.

Photo Blog

The time between bath and pajamas was too long. Devin needed to warm up!


We got a new lens for the camera and hadn't quite figured out how to work it.


Bath Picture.



Today was show day at Gymnastics. Trevor didn't really feel like participating. He preferred to sit still and watch the motion all around him.





Despite his lack of participation in the big finale for the semester, he was awarded a medal.


Devin will follow Trevor everywhere and do whatever Trevor does. It's cool.


See that tree? It gets all broken like that in the winter, but then recovers in the summer. Poor Tree.


Here's the center of the tree.


this is the tree next to it.


Someone told me I could cut this back and it would grow up all nice and pretty. I love to prune things, so I cut it all the way to the ground. I think this is a pretty picture. But, the bush itself never recovered from my severe pruning. It's pretty thin.


Same shot. Photo-shopped.


Macro mode. It's fun when it works (which would be all the time if I knew what I was doing, but I don't so when it works for me, it's fun.)


Here's an extreme closeup of our horsey's eye.


Snow in Trevor's mittened hand.


He looks pensive in this picture, I think.


Wary, maybe?


Same look, different day, different kid.

Devin was being a pretty good subject, today:









When I was 5, I got this thought in my head. Smiling for a camera was not natural. So, my unnatural smile in those grade school (even high school) portraits is not surprising to me. What is surprising that Trevor's already got this idea about smiling for a camera.


I think, in fact, it was this picture where I began to think how absurd it was to smile at a camera behind which stood a person I didn't even know. The whole thing made me nervous. (and, where the heck did I get such a big head??)


Look at my hair. Why'd my mom fix my hair that way when she knew it was picture day?

Kids really do say the darndest things...

Like darn it. I suppose it's a heck of a lot better than dammy-it, but I have officially taught Devin how to say darn it. I can't remember what was frustrating me, but it was something, so I said darn it, and this morning Devin spent five minutes growling darn it at me.

Darn it.

But, that's not the real story here.

A few days ago, I was driving Trevor home from somewhere, and I noticed an "It's a Boy!" sign in a yard. I thought to myself what Trevor would think about having another sibling. Then, I wondered what he's missing out on by not having any sisters. So, I asked, "Trevor, do you think you would like to have a sister ever?"

He responded that he would like a sister. This surprised me. Half of the time, I think he would send Devin away if he could. Another sibling and a girl at that? That he would even entertain the thought was surprising. So was what he said next.

"I'd like a boy sister."

(By the way...two and out. No more babies, thank you very much.)

And the moral of this story is...

Whenever Trevor hears a story, either on the iPod or from a read book, I ask him what he has learned. Sometimes his answers surprise me (see Three Little Pigs). Other times, I have to lead him to the moral of the story.

Sometimes, though, I think it's probably just best to listen stories for their entertainment value only.

Take Snow White for example, the moral of the story there is "Don't take candy from strangers" or maybe "Don't trust strangers." But at the end of the story, the prince kisses a dead girl and brings her back to life and marries her and they live happily ever after. I'd like to add that there's no morals there. Don't kiss dead princesses, no matter how pretty they are. I left that one alone. Then, there's Green Eggs and Ham. What's the moral there? It is don't be afraid to try new things? But, does the protaganist know the antagonist, or is Sam-I-Am a stranger? Should the protaganist really be taking those green eggs from the strange Sam-I-am?

Parenting is really fraught with a lot of complexities.

++++++++++++++++++++++

On another note, Devin insisted yesterday that several people and things were funny, including Granpa. And, he thinks Granpa should come to his house. At least, I think he spent a lot of time talking about Granpa. He's also a little sicky now, with a cold and the usual accompanying asthma. He spent most of last night awake crying and saying "Oooweee." He never would tell us where exactly it hurt, so I pumped him full of albuterol. He's at the doctor this morning with Daddy, and I certainly hope he doesn't spend the entire morning there.

The Legend Continues

Once upon a time in a magical land, the Daddy stuck 1 quarter into a crain game, skillfully guided the claw into the middle of the pit of aliens, hit the button to drop the claw and gracefully snagged three green and black stuffed martians. Later that day (or week), he asked me to marry him. I had no choice but to say yes after such a skillful display of toy retrieval.

Seven years later, Daddy's red-headed progeny spied a crain game in a movie theater and asked for 2 quarters so that he could conquer the game on his own terms. Just as his Daddy did 7 years before, Trevor guided the claw to the sweetest spot above the toy pit and then hit the button to loose the claw. In one fell swoop, he retrieved a purple dinosaur and a magenta lobster. With the elegance only found in older siblings, he gave the magenta lobster to his little brother.

The legend continues...

Christmas, Trevor's Birthday, Sunshine

TREVOR's BIRTHDAY


























YOU are my SUNSHINE!!