It’s been ridiculously hot the past few days, so the kids and I were out in the pool for a bit trying to beat the heat. Unfortunately, the pool is one of those small jobs so the water has warmed past the point of refreshing. That said, it was still better than nothing.
After coming up from a dunk, the boy asked “Did you hear that Daddy?”
He uses “Daddy” in a couple of contexts, one of them is when he’s working me for something. I can almost feel the high fructose buttering up in those cases. Another context is when he’s worried about something.
To answer his question, no I hadn’t heard anything and I told him so. Even so, I knew exactly what he was concerned about.
Thunderstorms.
So I kept going under the water, and every time I’d come up, he’d ask me again. His persistence sucked the lass in as well. “Yeah Dad, I heard it too. What is it?”
Finally, I told them “It’s a monster.”
“Really?” the lass asked. Honestly, she did. You gotta love 6 year olds.
“Yep, it’s a monster. He’s over there,” I said pointing at the woods behind our house. “I’d been hoping to keep him a secret from you for a bit longer, but you’ve forced my hand. He sleeps during the day and hunts at night.”
“Dad, I want you to be serious. Don’t joke around” intoned the boy.
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t want you to, I really want to know what the noise is.”
Nothing like a fun sucker. Fine, OK. It’s a thunderstorm. Actually, by this time, they should have just known it was thunder. The rumbles were coming pretty steadily from the North, plus the clouds were slowly moving in. It was still hot though.
I stayed in the water for a few more minutes, and then figured it was time to get out.
“Are you getting out because of the thunderstorm?” they asked.
Jiminy friggin’ cricket. Sometimes it seems like I can’t do anything without some kind of explanation. Especially when they’re agitated about something.
“No, I just decided it was time to get out and dry off,” I told them.
“Should we get out of the pool?” they asked.
“Only if you’ve had enough,” I answered.
As it happened, I suggested to them it was time to get out one the clouds blocked out the Sun. The rumbles were growing and it had become clear that they would hit before too long. I did everything as non-chalantly as I could, not wanting to set them off any more than was necessary.
When the storm finally did hit, it wasn’t the worst thing in the world but it was pretty good for this neck of the woods. We had a brown out when it peaked and the majority of the lightening was hitting near us. A couple of times, the kids asked if the lightening had hit something. It said “Sure, the ground.”
Based on their reaction, that wasn’t what the meant.
But the worst of the storm passed in about 15 minutes and, as I stated earlier, the worst wasn’t that bad.
But it was enough.