That Other One

If you are my friend on Facebook, you have heard this story, albeit in truncated form. Pardon my overlapping stories--there are only so many things that go through my big old fat head every day that are not "CHOCOLATE!" or "SSSSSHHHHHOOOOOOOEEEEESSSSSS!" (In other news, my life is, indeed, a Cathy comic strip. Ack.)

Last night, my son realized that he needed to do a book report. It is actually due on Thursday, but he has to turn it on Wednesday, as he is going on a gifted and talented field trip on Thursday, and then well, Matt and I are going out tonight and he has to have Matt's help with the book report. Actually, strike that. He doesn't need Matt's help at all--he is fully capable of writing a report and doing a decent job of it--but Matt has to be there for his own self, because he wants to sit over Sam's shoulder and be all helicopter-dad and talk to him about dangling modifiers like he is a 19 year old college freshman and not an 8 year old kid. Being our kid is FUN.

So Matt asks him what he wants to do the report on. And Sam thinks a bit, reconsiders his parameters (Harry Potter and LOTR being off limits as they are over 50 pages long), and then says, "The Nose." Meaning the short story by Gogol. And while I adore that my child reads Gogol, and golly gee is he smart, of course, I am sitting there thinking, "OH MY GOD, MY CHILD WILL NEVER HAVE FRIENDS AND HE DOESN'T LIKE SOUP AND SOMEDAY HE MAY MOVE TO BOSTON!" Because I am a mom and I worry. It is just what I do. If I were a super hero, worrying would be my power. My action figure would have amazing self-wringing hands and a nervous stomach that gurgles during my children's spelling bees.

So all of this is going on, and the house is loud because I'm watching a rerun of Hoarders while I fold clothes (Hoarders related cleaning is amazing--therapeutic and amazingly efficient), and Matt is encouraging Sam to cut it down a little, because left to his own devices, Sam's book report might be 25 pages long. Alice suddenly appears. She wriggles out of her "I love cupcakes" t-shirt, given to her by her adoring big sister. Then she wriggles out of her yoga pants, flinging them to the side just so. Then she is standing there, in nothing but a pink Bum Genius diaper. Effortlessly, and I mean effortlessly, she pulls the snaps open, pulls off the diaper in one swift motion and twirls it above her head as if lassoing something particularly large.

"I'M NAKED!"

That's what she yells, and the house goes a little quiet for a bit. And then she erupts into giggles, turns around and runs into the bathroom, cackling like the little maniac that she is. I am left holding a newly clean t-shirt and wondering if strip clubs offer any kind of benefit packages that does not include all the drinks you can guzzle.

So, yes, I have the two children in the gifted and talented program, one who started a dinner time conversation about hexadecimals the other night and the other who is doing a second grade book report on a satirical short story published in 1835. And that is all well and good. But I also have that other one, and Lord only knows what she will be. Right now, she wants to be a ballerina when she grows up, but when she says that, it also sounds like she is saying that she wants a burrito. All I know is that she has an effervescent smile that lights up the room and that I am so happy that she is mine. Clothed or not.

Just remind me of that the day she calls me and asks me to bail her out of jail. Please.