Me:
“You did?! I wonder if that means he’s coming to town.”
Troy:
“Yeah, he’s coming to bring us lots of presents.”
Me:
“He will, but only if we’re good boys. Do you think we can be good boys this
year?”
Troy:
“Yeah, we can do it.”
Me:
“I’m not sure I can be a good boy.”
Troy:
“You can do it, dada. I believe in you.”
Me:
“Thanks, bud. I appreciate that. I may need your help though.”
Troy:
“That’s okay, I’ll help you, dada.”
Me: “Thanks, bud.”
Me:
“I didn’t call you crazy.”
Troy:
“Yes you did!”
Me:
“When did I call you crazy?”
Troy:
“Last week.”
Me:
“Oh. Well, are you crazy?”
Troy:
“Yeah.”
Me:
“Then, why can’t I call you crazy?”
Troy: “You just can’t.”
Whatever it is, things have shifted. I haven’t been able to play with him like I used to because of my knee, and now throw this rejection on top of it. The saddest part is that my wife seems to find his clinginess more of an inconvenient annoyance than the blessing that it is. It’s true that you never have a moment’s peace, but one day all you’ll have is peace, and you’ll wish for a little curly head to pop into the bathroom and talk to you.
Maybe
what we both need is just some balance. Sometimes you’re the chosen one,
sometimes you’re not. With Troy, it’s all or nothing. We can’t really function
as a team, because he wants a duet and then that other guy. And when I’m that
other guy, I’m not allowed to do even the simplest thing like dry him off after
his bath, or comb his hair, or read him a book. All I hear through the repeated
screaming is, “No! Mama can do it!”
Me:
“Did you hit it on the table?”
Troy:
“Yeah.”
Me:
“Ouch! I bet that hurt.”
Troy:
“Yeah, but don’t cut it off, ok? It’s going to be all right. I don’t want a
robot arm.”
Me:
[laughing] “Okay, I won’t cut it off. But do you want some ice?”
Troy: “No, I’m good.”
Lately, whenever he gets hurt, I’ll look at his boo-boo, and I’ll tell him that we have no other option but to cut it off and replace it with a robot part. I’m just joking, but it serves the purpose to calm down his hysteria and redirect his focus. Then, instead of complaining about the non-existent boo-boo, he’s fiercely protective of his “wounded” body part.
So, I guess today when he bumped his elbow, he was trying to be proactive in case there was even the slightest question as to whether a robot arm was needed. The funny thing is that it didn’t even cross my mind until he said it. But it always makes me laugh, when he takes my own words and adapts them correctly to a new situation. He’s so witty.
Troy stayed true to himself and focused on his favorite food compliment. “Find a turkey inside the kitchen. Cook it with arms. Add chocolate sprinkles and rainbow sprinkles. Cook it in the oven. Make a chocolate turkey. Eat it…it tastes so good!”
So,
my wife decided to honor his culinary genius and found a chocolate gravy recipe
for turkey. And being the dutiful parents that we are, we both ate our turkey
with chocolate gravy and rainbow sprinkles, just like Troy! It was actually
really good. I even had it again for dinner.
Over Thanksgiving, we introduced my father and stepmother to this video. To Troy's and my great delight, they willingly participated in our crab dance-off. The four of us waved our "claws" in the air, bounced to the beat, and then went rogue in a writhing spasm of bodies that mildly resembled dancing, but was fun nonetheless. The action was physically exhausting, and all of us felt like we got a good workout before lunch/dinner. We may start a new exercise craze!
Me:
“Mama is at home. I’m not sure why she said that, because the plan was always
for me to come get you.”
Troy:
“Well, I’ll just wait here for mama.”
Me:
“No you won’t! Get in the car! She’s not going to drive all this way when I’m
already here.”
Troy:
“It’s okay, I can wait for her.”
Me:
“Come on, you little imp. Get in the car!”
Troy:
“You’re a little imp!”
Me: “No, you are!”
So, I decided to let Troy drive around the church parking lot for a little bit. He was in a crazy mood, so I gunned it while he jerked the wheel back and forth, doing a slithering snake pattern across the lines. He was laughing mischievously the entire time, like some kind of evil scientist. We did this for a few minutes until the sun finally set, then we headed to the toy store to look around.
I took Troy to a little shopping center near our house and was caught off guard when a horse-drawn carriage crossed the street in front of us. I had no idea what was going on, but we parked and headed into the bookstore, so Troy could check out the toys. After a good amount of time and at least one play-through of every single toy on every single aisle, we finally heard to the real toy store. We walked out of the back doors and were greeted by an enormous crowd!
It took my wife a little while to get ready (she was already in her pajamas) and meet us, so we had plenty of time to do multiple rounds on every single toy in the shop. The lady at the counter offered to show Troy how one of the toys worked, and she made an instant friend. After that, Troy was running around finding random toys and taking them back to her, so she could ooh and aah over his discoveries. I somehow managed to make it out the door with only having to buy one fairly-cheap, rubber cobra, and we joined my wife at the Christmas party.
We
spent an hour, walking around and listening to the various musical acts, which
ended up being all high school and junior high school kids. We bought some hot
chocolate to warm us up, since it was very cold outside, although I think Troy
enjoyed eating the cup of mini marshmallows more than the warm drink. We tried
to meet Santa and take a carriage ride, but the lines were way too long, and it
was too cold to stand still waiting in them. Ultimately, we had to leave when
Troy decided to let his “pee flag” fly, rather than tell us he had to go. It
was a strange and yet enjoyable evening.
Upon hearing about the sudden death of her close friend in a car accident, my wife broke down in uncontrollable sobbing. Troy went into the bathroom where she was and gave her a hug. He told her, “It’s okay, mama, don’t cry. I’ll fix it. I’ll make it all better. Please don’t be sad.” It wasn’t quite enough to pull her out of her sadness, but it was a sweet gesture.
This is a gigantic undertaking with donations exceeding thousands of food items. And each one had to be sorted and organized into three lines for packaging into paper bags that would later be delivered to needy families in the area. Since they never knew when a donation would arrive or what people would be bringing, lines might temporarily shut down waiting for a particular item, and workers would get shifted to another line to help out. My wife was awesome at always finding a place to serve and be useful. She’d bounce from station to station, lending an extra set of hands wherever it was needed.
On one occasion, a line had to be shut down because they ran out of soup. The two kids working that line panicked and asked the director what to do. She calmly replied that they should pray to God for more soup. So, they did. They no sooner got the word “Amen” out of their mouths, then a car pulled up outside stocked to the gills with soup! It was this kind of awesome faith and Godly answer that defined every shift. There was more food than there were people to pack it. So, people stayed late past their shift to lend a hand. And my wife loved the experience.
I wanted to pitch in as well, but obviously someone had to watch Troy while the other one worked, so I signed up to load the food into the trucks today. The church had rented eight U-haul trucks to deliver the food to various apartment complexes. Volunteers would then drive with the truck to the complex and hand-deliver the food to individual apartments. I was on the crew tasked with physically putting the bags on the U-Hauls.
After the trucks would deliver their bags they’d come back to the center to get another load. So, our crew unconsciously organized itself into jobs to handle the volume and quick turnaround. Some people would count off bags, one from each group based on how many went on each truck. Some people would load the bags onto carts, drive them to a truck, and unload them into the truck. While others would grab more bags from the back and bring them to the front for staging.
One guy was in charge of organizing and running all of this. He was responsible for giving instructions to volunteers and assigning them to the various jobs. He also had to keep track of every truck, how many sets should be loaded on every trip, and where that truck should head. As the morning wore on and more and more volunteers showed up to help, this became a daunting task. So, he appointed me to be his right-hand man. I would tell him what truck pulled into the bay, and he’d tell me how many sets needed to be loaded on it. I then would assign a crew to fill the order.
We had a well-oiled machine going once everyone found their niche. A few guys, like myself, helped out in almost every area, filling in wherever the need was greatest at the time. It was hard, sweaty, back-breaking work, and I loved every minute of it! I reveled in the manual labor, and I reveled in the role of leadership. It was amazing to see that many people come together, donating their time, to serve a bunch of people they had and may never meet. It was also amazing to see the generosity that manifested itself in the sheer volume of donations. We loaded trucks non-stop for four hours!
As
the loading was finally winding down, my wife and Troy showed up, and we went
on a few delivery runs with the trucks. We wanted Troy to experience the joy of
giving back and blessing others as we have been blessed. So, he’d help us carry
bags of groceries to people’s doors, see the look of surprise and excitement on
their face, and get to wish them a Happy Thanksgiving. He may not remember it
all later on, but hopefully a seed is getting planted. And I know that we were
supposed to be blessing others, but my wife and I both agreed that this
experience was a blessing to us. So thankful that we were able to do it.
Random
Teacher: “Hey, Troy, it’s pretty cold out today, isn’t it?”
Troy:
“Yeah.”
Other
Random Teacher: “Hey, Troy, did you get wet out there?”
Troy:
“A little bit.”
Yet
Another Random Teacher: “Hi, Troy! How are you today?”
Troy:
“I’m a little tired.”
Little
Blonde Girl: “Hey look, it’s Troy! Hi, Troy!”
Me:
“Man, bud, you’re really popular.”
Troy: “Yeah, they all know me as ‘Troy.’”
He
said that like he was so well-known that he only needed one name. And he was so
cool the entire time, like this sort of thing happens to him a lot. It reminded
me of one of those movies where the QB of the football team was walking down
the hall of the high school. And everybody stopped to call out, or touch his
letterman jacket, or fist bump him. I was witnessing the equivalent of
popularity at a three-year old level.
Me:
“Okay, it looks like the first obstacle is this tree with the giant snake in
it. How are you going to get past that?”
Troy:
[pulling out his sword and whacking the snake with it, pulling down the snake
and the tree it was hanging in] “Look at that, I chopped down the tree! I got
Kaa!”
Me:
“Yes, you did. That was fantastic. You took down the entire forest, and a tree
is now laying across the river. Before we cross, what are you going to do about
the crocodile in the river?”
Troy:
[also whacking it with the sword] “That takes care of the crocodile!”
Me: “Okay, I guess we can now cross the river, but now you have a choice. If you go straight ahead, the path is shorter, but you’ll have to pass through a village. This village is filled with vicious, mean dinosaurs. These dinosaurs are angry all the time. They’ve even formed a dinosaur fight club, so they can get out their aggression while they wait. If you go through there, they will definitely attack you.
Or, you can crawl through this secret tunnel that will lead you around the dinosaur village. It’s a lot longer path, but nothing will attack you on the way. But at the end of the tunnel is a giant wall blocking the path. So, you will have to figure out how to get over it before you can proceed.
Which
path do you want to choose?”
Troy
[without the slightest hesitation, he takes off running into the dinosaur
village, sword flailing wildly] “I’m going to attack the dinosaurs while
they’re sleeping!”
Me:
“You’re going to take on an entire village of vicious, mean dinosaurs by
yourself with a sword!?”
Troy:
[running in a circle, whacking each dinosaur with the sword like a maniac]
“Yeah! They’re going to try to eat us. Well, everyone except Bumpy. She’s a
good guy. We won’t attack her. We’ll take her with us.”
Me:
“Wait. We’re now going to carry an Ankylosaurus with us on our journey? Won’t
she slow us down?”
Troy:
“She’s going with us. She’s a good guy.”
Me:
“Okay, you’ve now wiped out the dinosaur village, even the Quetzalcoatlus
flying around up there. Now, what?”
Troy:
[picking up Bumpy, and juggling her with his sword and binoculars] “Now, we
head through the tunnel.”
Me:
“But you don’t need to go through the tunnels anymore. Now that you massacred
the dinosaurs, the path is clear straight to the sacred mountain.”
Troy:
“We’re going through the tunnels.”
Me:
“Okay, you’ve managed to crawl all the way through the tunnels, and now you’re
faced with a giant wall blocking…”
Troy:
[bull rushing the wall of boxes and sending them flying in every direction]
Me: “…the path. Or not. It’s no longer blocking the path. I really thought that was going to take longer to get over.
Okay,
now you’ve reached the foot of the sacred mountain. The mountain is protected
by two guardians. They will not let you pass until you correctly answer a
riddle. The riddle is this. ‘What is black and white and can be dunked in milk
and eaten? Mama gives them to you all the time, but you normally twist them
open and lick the cream out before eating them.’”
Troy:
[thinking a few seconds before taking his sword and cutting down both
guardians] “I don’t know, but now we can climb the mountain.”
Me:
“You can’t just kill the sacred guardians. You’re supposed to answer their
riddle.”
Troy:
“They’re dead. Let’s go.”
Me:
[sighing] “Fine, you’ve just killed the guardians and climbed over the sacred
mountains. You now find yourself in a dark cave. It is too dark to see
anything, but you can hear a deep rumbling coming from over there. What do you
do?”
Troy:
“I turn on a light.”
Me:
“Okay, you ignite the Flame of Eternal Fire, and the cave bursts with light. In
the distance, you see a giant castle, and in front of the castle is an ice
dragon. No ordinary sword can kill the ice dragon. His skin is too tough. What
do you do?”
Troy:
“That’s why we have Bumpy.”
Me:
“Wait. So, you saved Bumpy from the dinosaur village, so she could fight the
ice dragon, because she’s the only one that can kill him?”
Troy:
“That’s right.”
Me:
“You already knew way back then that you’d need Bumpy?”
Troy:
“Of course. She’s the good guy. She has to fight the ice dragon with her tail
like she did Toro. Her tail can kill him.”
Me:
“Wow! Okay. So, Bumpy is our secret weapon. We move to the castle, and we
release the Bumpy to fight the ice dragon. Their battle is legendary. The ice
dragon breathes blue fire, but Bumpy’s hard armor protects her from the cold
flames. Bumpy swings her tail in response, and there’s a crack and a deafening
thud as her tail breaks through the dragon’s tough skin and breaks his bones.”
Troy:
“And the ice dragon falls down and dies.”
Me:
“The ice dragon is now dead. So, now what do we do?”
Troy:
“We explore his castle.”
Me:
“We explore the ice dragon’s castle, and we find a treasure hoard of gold and
jewels. We can’t possible carry it all, but we take a little bit in our pockets
and vow to return.”
Troy:
“Bumpy will guard the castle for us.”
Me:
“And Bumpy becomes the new master of the castle. But it’s okay, because she’s a
good guy. Right, bud?”
Troy:
“That’s right. She’s the good guy.”
Me:
“I’m so glad we saved her from the dinosaur village.”
Troy:
“Me too.”
Troy:
“They fly in space.”
Me:
“And what do they fly in?”
Troy:
“Heff-a-hoes!”
Me:
“Heff-a-hoes? What’s that? Is that when you don’t have a whole hoe, then you
might have a hef-a-hoe?”
My
Wife: [cracking up laughing]
Troy:
“Nooo! It’s the alien spaceship. The yef-a-hoe.”
Me:
“Is that like a UFO?”
Troy: “Same thing.”
Me: “Okay, got it.”
