An amazing two and a joke

Spent the morning hanging out with my kids and my two nephews in the backyard. My girls are 10 and 7, and my nephews are 4 and 2. They had a fantastic time, although the two year old had a different view of the events from everyone else.

He is fairly verbal, but primarily in Polish and the games are going on in English At the beginning of this incident he was playing in the sandbox on his own quite peacefully. The others were all playing a rather involved game of Pirate which eventually led them to the sandbox to bury treasure.

The older kids arrive at the sandbox in a galloping herd, scream to a halt, leap in and begin digging frantically.

The little one (TLO) looks up as they arrive, kind of suprised, but happy to see them, and suspends what he was doing to watch.

- Stares stunned - blink - as they leap into the sand box with him and start to dig.
- Pause.
- Blink.
- Open mouth stare, then a small shake and he looks about for a shovel.
- The head bubble ......uuuuuhhh Okay.
- He starts to dig his own hole in front of him.

The other kids shove their bucket in their hole and start to fill it up again.

TLO looks up
- stares,
- blinks,
- watches,
Then turns to his hole and starts to fill it in again

-Oh, OK.

The others suddenly leap up and run off. Treasure successfully buried.

-Looks up AGAIN, watches them disappear into the distance.
-Pause.
-Blink.
-Hmmmmmm.
-TLO looks down at his own hole and over at theirs and gets up, goes over to theirs and continues to cover it.
-OK, I guess that is the plan......

The others, suspecting that he is digging UP their treasure, rush back in a body.

TLO looks up at them, and they stare down at him.

-Uhhhh so now what.

Rapid conversation between the older ones and me.

No I will not remove him, no he is not harming your treasure and he is not ruining the game. He is a really a giant land crab working nearby. (Read Treasure Island lately?) They buy this and run off.

Meanwhile, TLO has watched this interchange in suspended animation, only moving his head like a spectator at Wimbledon.

-What now?
-blink
-blink

Watches them run off and continues to happily fill in the hole.

Shortly, they return to retrieve their treasure. Leap into the box, push TLO aside, gently, and pull it out.
TLO stares and watches them (-blink) until it appears, then with a shriek, leaps in and grabs the bucket

-Hey wait, I'm supposed to be burying that
-delivering confused stares at all the others.

They get it away from him, commenting that the land crabs are particularily troublesome this time of year and run off with the bucket.

TLO stands,
-pause
watches them go
- blink
- blink
- blink
- pause.
Looks down at the hole.
Looks at his shovel, drops it.
Walks off after the others.

By now I had the heel of my hand jammed in my mouth to desperately stop myself from rolling around on the ground with laughter and disrupting the sequence.

It is a wonder they don't throw more tantrums than they do. The line between what they want and what they understand and what they have to do is so blurred, they must actually have the patience of saints to put up with it all.


On a completely different note, here is a slighty dirty joke (you've been warned) sent to me by a friend, who got it from her mother.

God Bless !

Miss Beatrice, the church organist, was in her eighties and had never been married. She was admired for her sweetness and kindness to all. One afternoon the pastor came to call on her and she showed him into her quaint sitting room. She invited him to have a seat while she prepared tea.

As he sat facing her old Hammond organ, the young minister noticed a cut-glass bowl sitting on top of it. The bowl was filled with water, and in the water floated, of all things, a condom! When she returned with tea and scones, they began to chat.

The pastor tried to stifle his curiosity about the bowl of water and its strange floater, but soon it got the better of him and He could no longer resist.

"Miss Beatrice", he said, "I wonder if you would tell me about this?" pointing to the bowl.

"Oh, yes," she replied, "Isn't it wonderful? I was walking through the Park a few months ago and I found this little package on the ground. The directions said to place it on the organ, keep it wet, and that it would prevent the spread of disease. Do you know I haven't had the flu all winter."