Day 211: Spilled Coffee

1/18/2012

Today was a pretty descent day. I went to work, ran some errands after work, and hung out with a friend for a bit. Overall, it was a good day. After all the running around, the kids and I came home and relaxed for the rest of the evening.

I have to say that last night my son said something that was so incredibly funny that I thought I would share it. Last night I decided to brew some decaf coffee for me as a little warm-me-up treat. I then sat down in the living room with it and watched some cartoons with the kids. They had a good day at school and got all their work done, so I let them watch some TV after dinner. Daniel and I were sitting down on the couch, Emily was in and out of the room, and Natalie (my little bird) was eating slowly, still not done with her food. I told her that if she got done with her food in time, they could all have some dessert. So, of course, the other two started cheering her on to finish her food. I was still on the couch, sipping my coffee when my son runs in from the dining room table and starts jumping up and down, cheering that Natalie finished her dinner. That is when he got a little too excited and knocked over my coffee. I yelled simply because it hurt. It wasn't directed at my son, just a general "Ow, it is hot" and "Man that hurts!" kind of yell. Of course, Daniel felt so bad, he started crying and ran to the other side of the living room. Emily ran and got me a towel and Natalie got me some paper towels. Once the initial sting went away, I was able to compose myself enough to talk to Daniel and tell him that I knew it was an accident and that I wasn't yelling at him, just yelling that it hurt. After a minute of reassuring him that he wasn't in trouble, that accidents do happen, he walked over to me and gave me a hug. Then he said, "I am sorry I burned you mommy. Next time, can you please drink something cold, like milk, so when I spill it again it doesn't burn you?" I couldn't help but laugh a little. I told him I would take that into consideration. He smiled and went about his night.

The funny part was that he is counting that it will happen again. Not that he is trying to make it happen, but that he knows it is a possibility and wants the ramifications to be less severe. It made sense. He is pretty bouncy and has a tendency to knock over things, so at least if he does it again, it won't hurt me. I guess I can make that connection to real-life as well. You know bumps are going to happen. You know there are going to be days where you just can't seem to keep from knocking things over. All you can do is try and keep the destruction to a minimum by keeping yourself out of destructive patterns or bad situations.

Sometimes I can tell that a bad day is coming, just that sense of the stresses of the deployment creeping in along with the kids acting up and a rough day at school. Now, if I wanted to burn myself, I would come home and force myself to get the house spotless, the laundry done, and the kids in perfect order. That is making the choice to have coffee when you know you are likely to get it dumped all over you. It is the kind of task that if I don't get it done on that of all days, I will get burned. Those kinds of requirements I put on myself with my less that 4 hours every evening before I get the kids to bed, can be a bit hard to accomplish. When I don't accomplish them, I get stressed, depressed, angry, or I feel worthless.

On the other hand, I could choose milk. I could chose to tell myself that I am going to do the dishes, one load of laundry, and read a story to the kids. If I get more done than that, great, if not, it is okay because I really only wanted to get those 3 do-able things done. Hence, my bad day does not get worse. My spill is just a spill instead of a spill and a burn.

Again, I know sometimes I read too much into what my son says, but sometimes you really can apply the simplest things said by a child to adult life and situations. I don't know why, but sometimes things kids say can make you think about adult issues.