Tag: the boy

The boy’s mouth is now fully outfitted with gear. He has wires on the top and bottom and rubber bands for tension to start correcting his cross bite. It only took the orthodontist 10 minutes to get it all done- not knowing what to expect, I was surprised how quick it was.

The boy was OK with it at the office, but the reality of it has been settling in since then. He has to learn how to attach the rubber bands himself because he isn’t supposed to wear them when he eats. One of the implications hit him when we got home- eating lunch at school. For the moment, he doesn’t want to go to school. Although he’s also bemoaning his getting the elastics in the first place.

Growing up I remember the old mantra “It builds character” (Not that it was used on myself a lot, but it’s a pretty familiar parental quip). I’d say the boy is experiencing that sort of thing now.

One thing this past weekend’s experience with the boy has me wondering is when did I learn how to play baseball?

I’m wondering this because it’s clear that the boy has no idea how the game is played. He doesn’t understand being out, or how to play in the field, or how to run the bases. None of it. And the thing of it is I can’t find fault with his ignorance. When I sit and think about it I can’t really think of any reason why he should know any of it. Last year was the first time he’d played any organized baseball, and the version we played was so far from actual baseball rules that it can only be considered a primer in the sense that we got to bat and play in the field.

The thing is, I’ve never played organized baseball either. I didn’t play in Little League or high school or any rec leagues. Never. I played ‘catch’ with the Father (as he is now so dubbed for blog purposes- I briefly considered “the Patriarch” but; however amusing to myself, it didn’t seem like a good fit) a plenty growing up. He also used to pitch to me in our backyard. I even remember having a black, Pete Rose baseball bat that I beat to death. I remember practicing batting by hitting rocks across the road with it. That did a number on the bat.

But I don’t ever remember having baseball explained to me, and yet I also can’t remember ever not knowing how to play baseball. For that matter, I don’t really remember having any games that we played explained to us. I can only assume that I just learned by watching other kids play, or by jumping in and figuring it out on the fly.

So how to relate to the boy? Initially, I’ve been assuming that he’ll figure the game out by participating and observing. The catching, hitting and throwing(the physical aspects of the game), he’s picking up on just fine. But he isn’t picking up on the rules of the game at all. He’s not alone either as a number of his teammates’ fathers have also related similar experiences with their boys. Yet all of them also understand how to play baseball. But this isn’t the case for all the boys- some of them definitely understand how the game is played.

Perhaps it’s a result of him not watching a lot of TV generally, and sports in particular. But I can’t really remember sitting in front of the TV watching sports other than football; though, perhaps my memory is failing me here. By the same token, the couple of times we’ve tried to sit and watch a game, he hasn’t really shown much interest in watching. Not that I can blame him- regular season baseball is tough to watch. Plus, most times the games are on at bad times- like after his bed time, or during the afternoon on a beautiful day.

Given his game schedule (two games a week), I’m confident that the situation will be largely rectified by the end of the season. But I can’t help but feel like I failed him in some small way here. Sure, baseball is hardly the most crucial part of growing up. But at the same time, it was clearly a part of my growing up and understanding it is crucial to being able to appreciate why football is a vastly superior sport.

A final interesting thought- will he find himself in a similar situation some day? For that matter, perhaps I don’t remember my own childhood correctly and the Father was wondering similar things while I was growing up. If that’s the case, then it isn’t a kid thing. It’s a parent thing.

We visited a science center recently and one of the interactive exhibits had one of the old tavern puzzles. The Old Shackles variety to be specific. Both of the kids were instantly smitten with them and that’s when the Wife informed them that we had a whole bunch of them at home.

I’d totally forgotten about them until she had mentioned it. We not only had the same one as at the science center, but a number of others. I recall first coming across them in high school. They were fun to work out even if they were all twists on the same basic principles. The lone exception was the Patience Puzzle– a very appropriately named challenge. It literally took years of on and off work on it before I finally solved it.

Anyway, I pulled all of them out for the kids and they had a blast with them for about 5 minutes. When they realized that they couldn’t figure them out, the puzzles lost their luster. The boy, particularly, got very frustrated with my old version of Old Shackles. He had been able to solve the one at the science center, but couldn’t solve mine. Naturally, something had to be wrong with mine.

It’s a familiar pattern with him now. Any kind of new challenge turns into a tremendous exercise in frustration. He thinks he should be a master of whatever he chooses to do and when reality bites, well, he doesn’t like it.

As for me, I’ve managed to solve them all again, including the Patience Puzzle. If that means that I’ve learned patience, then there’s still hope for the boy.

This is how the day ended yesterday:

The boy and his friend taped this up to the boy’s bedroom door. I’m have to confess, I’m confused as to what should concern me more, the level of spelling or that I’m apparently viewed as a girl. Sigh. At least I get some kind of exemptions status, for whatever that’s worth.

The lass isn’t one to take such matters lying down. After this sign was crafted, she came down the stairs and asked my how to spell “No boys allowed. Only Dads.” At least I was a boy again- and still retained my exemption status.

These amusing hijinks followed pretty much an entire day of the three of them getting along. They started the day off with the Wii. But I limited their time on it and they came to regret starting the day off on the Wii because I didn’t allow them to play it anymore after they were done. It wasn’t a great day, weather-wise, but it wasn’t raining and there was no reason they couldn’t go outside.

By the end of the day they’d played a couple of games of checkers, hide-and-seek, tag, a brief round of trying to get behind me so they could slap my rear (they didn’t- even when they tried the obvious head fake that the game was “over” while quickly walking around me for another shot), played in the sandbox and some kind of game where the object was to get the kid on the floor to roll over onto their bellies from their back. So it ended up being a pretty full day for them. Along the way the lass helped me prepare some dinner. That gave the boys a chance to hang together without the “third wheel.”

But the highlight of the day was definitely the sign. Good to know that the eternal struggle between boyz and girlz will continued to be waged by the next generation.

Went to pick-up the boy from school yesterday. As is the norm for most schools now, I imagine, I had to wait in line while the teachers shuffled the kids to predetermined spots on the sidewalk. You patiently wait in line for the kids in front to load up until it’s your turn. Fun stuff.

The lass was with me and her booster seat is on the passenger’s side. So when it was time for the boy to jump in, he did so through the front-side passenger door. However, where in the past he just kept on going right to his spot in the back, this time he just sat with a smile on his face. He didn’t outright ask, and he didn’t have to because the expression on his face communicated perfectly what he was after.

There is no minimum age limit for riding in the passenger seat here. We’ve double checked it. I’m fairly sure some of the states around us are different. Since I recalled riding shotgun many time I was the boy’s current age, I really couldn’t come up with an objection.

So then we had a mini fiasco as a couple of things hit at once: the lass objecting to her brother sitting up front and we were now holding up the line. The boy still had his backpack on and wasn’t buckled in. I brushed off the lass by telling her she still had to sit in the booster seat because she was too young. But I’m sure she’s counting the days.

So now the question will be when he can ride shotgun. In another year, they’ll be fighting over who sits in the front seat. The race for the car will be vicious I suspect. I’m sure his friends will notice that he’s riding up front and they’ll start pestering their parents.

I imagine I’ll be blackballed by the end of the month at the latest.

The boy is off to get his braces at the moment. He’d been OK with the idea until he mentioned it to some of his friends yesterday at school. Apparently, a bunch of 6-year olds were amazed he was getting braces at such a young age. Or something like that. Anyway, after that encounter he wasn’t so keen on the idea.

But he trooped off this morning without much in the way of complaint. I decided to give him a heads up that his friends may laugh at him when they see him with the braces on the first time. He still doesn’t like being laughed at, so I just wanted to prepare him and reiterate taht the best thing he can do is laugh along with them. I don’t anticipate any problems. Though I’m sure he’ll be a bit depressed about the whole thing.

This’ll be one of those character building experiences, I reckon.

UPDATE:
He’s doing well after the first few hours. The ortho was impressed enough with him that he told the Wife he wished all his child patients managed as he did. So +1 for the boy.

The boy seems to have fully recovered from whatever little bug caught hold of him Monday. He’ll be returning to school today.

The item worth noting in all of this is yesterday, the lass brought home the school work he had missed over the past couple of days. He was feeling better all day yesterday and, unprompted by the Wife or myself, he sat down and worked on his school work.

The relevant background with this is the last time this same situation occurred, the Wife and I had to tag team him and actively work him to do his school work. He complained about it the entire time. He even tried to do it so poorly that the Wife and I would just give up on it, forcing us into the old “It’s not worth it” box.

Not so yesterday. The only questions he asked were for clarification on some of the instructions. His only frustration came when he’d made a mistake on one of his sheets and had some trouble tracking down where it occurred. After he found it, he completed that sheet without further problem.

It’s always nice to know that, occasionally, effort is rewarded.

Here on the blog, I have a tendency to note kid related events that range from humorous to missteps. It’s easy to overlook the fact that a good part of the time, the kids are, actually, pretty well behaved. It’s even easier to overlook the simple task of giving credit where it’s due.

With that in mind, allow me to relate a bit about the boy’s weekend, noteworthy mainly for its lack of noteworthiness. It doesn’t make for the greatest blogging material, per say, but I’d like to give him credit for his good behavior.

For some reason, the boy doesn’t like to change his underwear. I do not understand this at all.

I mean, I figured he would go on some sort of laundry efficiency kick when he became a teenager; but, I wasn’t necessarily going to have to be aware of it. Contrast that with, seeing as the Wife and I are responsible for the laundry, it’s hard not to notice when there’s 5 days of laundry in the basket, minus the expected quantity of underwear.

Parenting is not for the timid.