Kids – The Gift that Keeps on Giving

The squeeze and I have a busy life at the best of times.  More often than not, the hectic pace comes from his side.  He was stupid enough to have another kid while most people are shooing them out of home; or at least trying too.

I suspect it was a “let’s save the marriage” baby since they had broken up (again) prior to the last one, but who knows?  And at the end of the day, we all know how well that theory works, so what does it matter? 

Frankly, I’d rather buy him a Harley to save the marriage.  At least you can sell it after the marriage is done and dusted.  With a thirteen year old boy, about all you can do is sell him for healthy organs.

Either way, with a kid around on weekends there is a hell of a lot of too and fro.  He lives a distance away in the land of velvet and the school is even further from that so the squeeze is off in the car a lot.  Today it is cricket.

This morning, while they got up at dawn and drove to God knows where to do the cricket thing, I got to stay in bed.  Now, at 9am – what I consider a far more civilised hour to wake up on a weekend; I get to still be in bed blogging.  As you can see, I’m alright with the down time, even if that down time is done on the other side of town in ‘clean freak hell’.

Once, I would be up doing housework by now.  These days I’m on strike.  When I walked in last night I changed the bed and did the washing.  That was it.  I didn’t touch any dishes – not even the glass sitting on the bench that had something mouldy growing in there.  I have a hair trigger gag reflex so I didn’t get too close to look.

I should point out amongst the organ selling and house from clean freak hell, that these are great kids.  They are witty and funny and possess a good dose of sarcasm, which I admire.  They also possess the stupidity of youth which as adults provides us with endless entertainment.  For myself, it is because I remember well all those stupid things I did.

Last night, when I walked in, middle son is in the bathroom, twisted around in an odd fashion and giving himself a haircut.  I pray and hope he doesn’t ask me for an opinion, because even from the doorway I can see the huge bald patches all over the back of his head where he has pointed the clippers in the wrong direction so is now effectively bald in hand sized patches all over the back of his head.  Not to mention the longer bit on top is now varying in length, some bits are inches longer than others.

I put my head down to stifle a grin and set about tidying the squeezes room.  I can shut down the clean freak gene since this is not my environment and am on strike – but I sure as hell can’t shut it down where the bedroom is concerned.

Number two son goes back to the bathroom with clippers and does that age old mistake that we have all done – attempts to fix it. 

I change the bed and drag limp and somewhat grey looking sheets out to the laundry.  Although the emotional husk is somewhat proud thinking he is an emotional husk, I’m not unaware that he has purchased new bedding sets when we started going out.  I remember raising my eyebrow at the time; not because it wasn’t cute that he had done that – it certainly was cute.  But he had purchased white.

Much of my bedding is white; but since I wash regularly and iron everything, it is pristine white; and I just know that these bed sets are not going to get the same attention.  One quick sweep of the room tells me that.

Anyway, I walk the limp sheets to the laundry passing the bathroom and there it is.  “Does it look that bad?”

Well I’m not going to lie to the kid, but I figure I can at least soften the blow so I tell him it looks a little uneven but not too bad.  I take over and attempt to fix the long parts that now reside amongst the bald patches but mention to him short of shaving it completely; there isn’t much to be done.  Instead, I even the top. 

Amazingly, he seems pleased, showers and dresses to go out. 

I continue making the bed, grinning and hoping he doesn’t turn his back on anyone he fancies.

I'm just glad he has gone out before the squeeze and number three child get home, because I know they are going to ignore my text that said "don't mention his hair when you get home!"