LIVING WITH TODDLERS
What
do you do when you meet people and your hand has an intense physical or
emotional attraction to their face? You run up to them and touch or caress
their face, of course. Ehm, that’s only if you’re a cute three-year-old. If an adult
explores such an attraction, a backhand slap with the palm imprinted on your
face is the likely outcome. Kids. You’ve gotta love ’em. Adorable little munchkins. They can
run up to complete strangers and reveal family secrets. They say the silliest
things and embarrass their parents to no end. Impatient, cute and cuddly little
people. That’s why I’m writing this with a red and puffy right eye.
A
three-year-old boy flung out his hand and struck me in the face as we played. It
doesn’t matter if the person who hit your eye is a cute toddler. It still hurts.
Especially if the child strikes hard, like a pestle hitting a mortar. My right
eye was the unfortunate mortar and got a good pounding. I thought the
accidental meeting of hand and face was going to be quickly forgotten. But,
like most flings, it had serious consequences. I probably rubbed the eye too
hard.
I
woke up the next morning and my eyelids were stuck together by a sticky coat of
pus. The swollen eye looked like it got impregnated from the affair with the striking
hand. When I finally pried it open with my fingers, which I worked like a pair
of pliers, it looked irritated. Flings are temporary but their effects can
linger.
My
right eye, when it was not red-rimmed, was part of my identity and so I now faced
an identity crisis. I could not recognize this person in the mirror staring back
at me. I also realized my eyebrows had grown wild and unruly. A WTF (Wild
Terrifying Fling) moment if ever there was one. I had an important presentation
to make that day. I turned to the garden
pruning shears (for taming the eyebrows) and an over-the-counter eye drop (for
the red eye). I was hoping to restore my attractiveness or, at least, improve
my appearance. It worked because there were no awkward questions about my eye
affair during the presentation.
They
will spill hot chocolate on your phone, strike your face with their hands, head-butt
you during play (painful as hell), throw tantrums, and ruin your gadgets/furniture.
Toddlers generally cause chaos in unimaginable big ways. All you can do, most
times, is grit your teeth, smile and give them lollipops. You learn to take it
in your stride. There’s no middle ground with them. You either learn the virtue
of patience or they’ll drive you nuts.
