Tonight CPT Kindergarten came out to the living room after I put all the kids to bed and told me there was something that looked like a clam on the floor in his room and it was scaring him. He wanted to know if I could please come remove it. I acquiesced. We usually do this with one item a night so I was ready for the routine. It turned out he was afraid of a screw on lid with a flip top cap that somehow escaped the kitchen - and I'll be darned if it didn't look exactly like a clam. After bravely taking the lid back to the kitchen where it belonged I settled back down on the couch to finish nursing the baby when CPT Kindergarten rushed down the hall again. This time the big helicopter was scaring him. I wasn't sure if he was talking about the helicopters hanging from his ceiling or one of our toys. He thought it would be best if I just came and investigated myself. When we got to the room he pointed out a toy helicopter sitting on his chest of drawers.
"What about the helicopter is scaring you buddy?" I asked.
He replied. "The front and the back."
I dropped the helicopter on the other side of the drawers and dusted my hands of it. He was satisfied. I gave another round of "I love yous" and "now go to sleeps" and went back to the living room to finish feeding the baby. But CPT Kindergarten's imagination wasn't through yet. This time he said that it looked like there was a bird that wanted to peck him on the end of Sidekick Sister's bed. All I could say was, "huh?" So once more I followed his Spiderman pajamas that will work just perfectly in a flood down the hall. He showed me the corner of his sister's bed and sure enough, I could make out a pecking bird in the plastic bumper meant to protect unsuspecting ankles from sharp metal bed corners.
"Well buddy, I'll just pull your bed forward so you can't see the bird," I said. "Now that's three times I've come down here," I tugged him bumplily along. "Take a look around the room for me and see if there is anything else that might scare you because after this you can't come out again." He took a serious look around and contemplated.
"That rocket ship," he said pointing to his poor, pathetic, doorless, last-year's Christmas present.
I have absolutely, 100%, unquestionably no right to be frustrated with the boy about his fears. I believed there was a black panther living in a closet in the upstairs of our house when I was growing up. He could only come out when the hallway was dark and nobody else was around. I think I remember still believing in the black panther when I'd already passed the ages in the single digits. Sure, I thought to question whether or not the black panther could be real, but I never wanted to slow down to find out. As long as I'm confessing, there has been a night or two where I've pulled a mattress into my kids' room so that I would be with them when the thing struck.
See, you think you want to have children that are like you, but then it ends up that you want their lives to be much, much, much better than that. Oh CPT Kindergarten, may you never have to spend the night on my grandchildren's floor.
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