Tears Of Moo » Tommy

Where Are All the Girls?

meighan — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 08:28:44 +0000

This evening, before going to bed, Tommy was looking through a little Geotrax pamphlet, which lists all the available Geotrax trains (which include a driver) that the company makes. As he was admiring the trains, he stops for a second and asks me, “Hey… where are all the girls?”

Hmm. Good question. Apparently Geotrax has no female trains or drivers. Which makes sense, given that the line is largely marketed to boys. Still, I find it interesting that Tommy seemed to think it strange that there were no Geotrax girls. I guess even at his tender young age, he realizes that girls make the world a whole lot more interesting.

Good for you, Tommy. Good for you.

The Little Engine That Couldn’t?

meighan — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 08:55:42 +0000

A favorite book of Tommy’s these days is The Little Engine That Could. Every night he has us read that to him, and then he in return reads it back to us. (If you are unfamiliar with the story, essentially an engine has broken down and needs another engine to take its trains over the mountain. It stops 3 engines– a passenger engine, a freight engine, and a rusty old engine– all of which refuse to help. Finally a little engine, one that is only used to switch trains in the yard, appears and offers to take the trains over the mountain. And, of course, it repeatedly says, “I think I can”– demonstrating the power of positive thinking.)

However, Tommy seems to have gotten entirely the wrong message from that book. Rather than coming away with “I think I can”, he seems most riveted by the phrase used by the rusty old engine: “I can not, I can not, I can not.”

If he doesn’t want to do something– be it eat, brush his teeth, or put on his clothes– he tells me, “I can not, I can not, I can not.” I try to tell him that the rusty old engine wasn’t nice, because he didn’t even try. Doesn’t matter. He likes that phrase better, it seems.

Today, his retelling of the story was a bit different. He was doing really well, right up until he got to the rusty old engine. After that, every page became, “I can not, I can not, I can not.” The little blue engine that came to help instead said, “I can not, I can not, I can not.” ….The end. Sad story.

Come on, books shouldn’t use such a catchy bad phrase! Tommy couldn’t possibly be the only kid over the last 80 years to take away this message instead… could he?

Elevator Adventures

meighan — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 09:57:13 +0000

Today we had a bit of a mishap with the elevator. Tommy got on by himself, and wound up on another floor all alone.

Here’s the story as told by each of the players in this drama:

Toby’s version:

We had been cooped up in the house all day, so I decided to take Tommy out and get some fresh air. We set off ahead of Meighan and Athena and made our way towards the elevators. By the time we got there, I realized that Meighan and Athena were still not ready, so I leaned over to look at the street below as I waited for them.

The next thing I know is I hear what sounds like an elevator closing and sound of “clang” as if someone had hit a door with a scooter… it took me a moment to realize what happened… and when I turned around, sure enough, Tommy was missing. Oh snap!

I looked over at our apartment and saw Meighan exiting. I shouted, “Tommy left in the elevators without us!” and proceeded to call another elevator.

Of course as luck would have it, I get the other one, so I got in and tried to think where he might have gone… he knows how to press “2″, so I tried for that as my first option. As I passed around floor 7, I hear a “waaaAAAAAAAAAAaaa…aaa…h..”. Ok, I passed him… Yay…

When I reach the second floor, I’m greeted by our surprised neighbor wondering why I haven’t left the elevator yet… she gets on and I press the button to our floor (she’s in the unit next to us), explaining Tommy got in the elevators by himself… when suddenly I hear “wwwwwAaaAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHh….h…h…..” as I pass floor 3… oh great… he moved… (Our building’s elevators stop at 3 and 7, so I suspect it cycled the elevators when I sent the elevator back up…).

I drop her off then head back down to floor 3 and find… nothing. Greeaaat… Ok, I run up the stairs to 4… 5… no Tommy. Hmm, at this point I hear no crying, so I figure I should try going back to second floor. When I get there, to my surprise, I see Meighan, Athena, AND Tommy. Wee…

He explains to me he got lost and cried. So I explained to him my story of passing him in the elevators and hearing him cry. I try to ask him what his side of the story was and what I got was…
“So, what happened Tommy?” (Me)
“I cried.” (Tommy)

“Ok… um, before the crying, you pushed a button… and?” (Me)
“Then I cried!” (Tommy)

“Err… but before that, you got in the elevator, did you try holding it open?” (Me)
“Yes.” (Tommy)

“I guess you might have pushed close instead, then you tried tho hold it with your scooter.” (Me)
“Yes, but then I got lost. And cried. Then you found me.” (Tommy)

Well, you could say it makes up for being stuck in the house all day. If anything, I didn’t have any trouble with him not wanting to hold my hand on the walk to Burger King.

Meighan’s version:

I was trying to get myself and Athena ready. Toby was at the end of the hallway, by the elevators, and I was just heading out the door. Toby called out something to me. I assumed he was telling me that he and Tommy were going to wait for us downstairs, so I started heading towards the elevators. They were of course already gone by the time I got there, as expected, though oddly the doors opened as soon as we arrived at the elevator without us needing to press the button. We got in, and along the way, the elevator stopped at the 3rd floor. I heard a kid crying and assumed it was some kid with his mother about to get on; however, a hysterical Tommy got on instead, saying that he had lost his mommy. I waited a few seconds for Toby to follow before realizing that Tommy had been alone on that floor. We got out on the 2nd floor and I comforted him while waiting for Toby.

Tommy’s version:

I got off alone. I cried when I got off alone. Daddy went past me, and [Mommy] found me.

Out of the Mouth of Babes

meighan — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 21:18:10 +0000

This morning Tommy was playing with a toy laptop, and, getting frustrated, uttered the following words:

“F***ing stupid!”

Shocked, Toby and I asked him to repeat it. We weren’t mishearing it; that’s really what he said. After trying to explain that both words were not nice, and that the first one in particular was to never be used, we tried to find out where he had heard it.

Apparently a kid at his school had used the term. When prodded further, Tommy says that the kid also called him a “stupid f***er”. We told him to tell his teacher next time; he says he told his teacher and the teacher said, “Okay.” (She likely didn’t understand what he was saying. After all, three-year-olds can be hard to understand at times.)

It looks like we’ll be having a talk with the teacher on Monday.

I never dreamed we’d be dealing with this sort of thing so early. Oh, the things children learn… A poignant reminder to always be vigilant of the words that come out of your mouth.

Is it too early to worry about preschoolers falling into the wrong crowd?

meighan — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 04:08:22 +0000

Today was Tommy’s first day of preschool. This school, like many others, has a requirement that for the first two days, the child attends only until noon, with a parent in attendance. I went with him today, and Toby will be going tomorrow.

It certainly was interesting… and hectic. There were a little more than 20 kids in his class today; by the end of the month, there’ll be 30. Up to this point he’s been attending a private home childcare service, with only a couple of other kids at any given time. He seemed fine with all the kids there, though he had a tendency to wander off by himself. Several times he tried to leave the classroom to go play on one of the outside playgrounds.

Now, in regards to my title: I noticed there were a few boys that were especially rough-and-tumble. One of them in particular was apparently a bit violent, and the teacher threatened to call his father if he kept up his behavior. The whole time I was there I was secretly praying to myself that he would keep far, far away from those boys and instead play with the nicer, more gentle boys and girls.

Naturally, one of the boys from that group decided he liked Tommy. Shortly before lunchtime, while they were out on the playground, that boy decides to engage Tommy in play. Up until this point in time, Tommy had been playing with all the other various children, but never more than a few moments at a time. At lunchtime, this boy sat down next to him and wanted to be near him until it was time for us to leave.

Don’t get me wrong; I’m glad he has a friend. And to be fair, this boy seems more like a follower than one inciting aggressive play. He seemed to be fairly gentle the entire time he played with Tommy. I just worry that he’ll bring Tommy into the other group, and that Tommy will pick up some of their aggression. (I’ve seen this already from his other childcare situation, where he started pushing after being around a rowdier boy, who liked to push, headbutt, tackle, etc.)

I know it sounds silly, but I wonder: Is it too early to worry about a preschooler falling into the wrong crowd?

PS: Since some people apparently CAN’T TELL, the whole “is he falling into the wrong crowd” thing was meant to be a JOKE. While, yes, I would prefer if he stayed away from the rougher kids (I like that he’s more gentle), I’m not sitting here worrying about his future as a drug addict criminal or anything. Sheeeesh.