Last year on the 4th of July we were going through a little phase with The Big One (then just The Boy). He didn’t like to take a nap in the afternoon, you see. For those of you who don’t have little kids, missing a nap really sucks. Naptime is basically what allows parents to stay sane in the evening. If The Big One misses his nap, about 5:30 he starts basically going insane. He jumps around, headbutts us, tackles his brother, things like that.
Since we had plans to go as a family to a friend’s house for a cookout, we did not want the Mr. Hyde version of our son coming with us. So we devised a plan. We gave him a big breakfast, pancakes with a lot of watermelon afterwards. Then we put him in his trunks, took him out back, and chased him with the hose. We ran him for almost an hour, as I recall. This was right in the middle of last year’s drought, and our lawn was entirely brown from the lack of moisture and 95-degree heat, though it wasn’t quite that hot yet that day. He slept really well that afternoon, and was a lot of fun at the cookout that evening.
It turns out he really had a ball with this. This afternoon we repeated the event, a year later. The grass actually looks pretty good now. The heat isn’t nearly as oppressive as it was last summer. And of course he’s a year older and much bigger, though you wouldn’t know it from his baggy Spongebob trunks. I’d blast him with the hose and he’d run across the lawn, flopping down and rolling in the grass that just got cut yesterday. I’m sure he’ll have some new insect bites that have shown themselves in the morning, and I’ll probably have some of my own. That’s the penalty you get for going in grass in Kansas City. Still, it was the kind of thing that you remember when you get older. Who says summer isn’t any fun for adults?
The Rumpus Room 