My Morning Smile in 4 Acts

Act I: The wake up in which mommy wears a necklace and then regrets it

This morning was a special day for me because it was the first day I got to work in the palliative care clinic that my friend Kate and I have worked hard to get started. So today being a special day I decided to wear a necklace; just a simple one with a few pearly type things on it that matched my sweater.

Toby’s astute eyes didn’t miss a beat,

“Good morning, Toby!”

“Mommy – pretty! Necklace…BALLS!!!”

“Yes, mommy IS wearing a necklace today. These are PEARLS, though, not balls. Can you say PEARLS?”

“Balls. Toby KICK balls?”

And so we turned my necklace of lovely balls into a learning opportunity in which I taught him that it’s not nice to kick people in the neck.

Act II: Guess who’s coming to Dinner?

“Toby,” says mommy excitedly as he eats his breakfast, “Guess who’s coming for dinner tonight?”

“Emma?” he guessed without hesitation

“Nope – guess again…”

This time he thought a minute before answering, “Cookie Monster?”

I laughed a little (how can you NOT laugh at that…) but encouraged him to try ONE last guess…

He really thought hard for a minute before raising both hands in victory,

“BABY COMING!!??!”

Yes, he is STILL stuck on the baby coming.

The correct answer was Grandpa. When I told him this he broke into peals of laughter. As if the idea of GRANDPA coming to dinner was SOOO much more ridiculous than having COOKIE MONSTER show up.

ACT III: These are the people in his daycare class

After he calmed down from the hysterical suggestion of having my dad over for dinner, he started his usual musings as to the whereabouts of his daycare friends. Sometimes he asks me where they are, or sometimes he just thinks out loud to himself about them, “Hannah sleeping…” or “Owen - day care?” This morning, he seemed to realize they were all still at home. The only problem was that for some reason he added an “O” to the word home and punctuated his statements with “YA!!!” at the end. So it went something like this,

“Emily – Homo! Ya!”

“ Taylor - Homo! Ya!”

“Mikey – homo! Ya!”

And so it went on. Toby went through each and every kid in his daycare class, calling them all homos and then cheering. He sounded like a Dutch gay rights activist.

ACT IV: Watching for the Garbage Truck

Fridays mornings are somewhat easier than other mornings because it’s garbage day, so I can usually count on 2 minutes to myself as Toby stands on his stool at the window and watches excitedly for the garbage truck to come down the road.

This morning, as he waited impatiently and I tried frantically to multitask, Toby suddenly BURST into tears and JUMPED down from the stool, yelling, “BUG! BUG! BUG!”

I ran over to save him from what I assumed was going to be some large deathly tarantula, but instead found a tiny little fly that had obviously become victim to a toddler’s death grab.

As we say in palliative care, this fly was nearing the end stage of his disease; Chayne stokes breathing on my windowsill while my kid was having a conniption fit in the background. Unlike what we do in palliative care, I quickly euthanized the poor fly, cleaned up the remnants and escorted my son back to the window just in time to see the garbage truck go by.

I know I have complained before about how busy it is being a single parent in the mornings. But this morning, after having laughed and smiled repeatedly with him, I hugged and kissed my squirmy little guy goodbye and thought how absolutely wonderful my mornings with Toby are.