Me: Whatcha singing? Shouldn’t you be asleep?
Kiddo #2: I’m singing about how people never change, and nothing changes over time. So don’t worry about changing people, because they can’t change.
Me: (inner-triumphant screams of joy that I have, clearly, birthed a Post Modern baby out of my love of the literature) Sorry? Aren’t you 3?
Kiddo #2: Yes. I am three. And at my next birthday I will be four. And also, I want to have a Lego party.
Me: Ok. Well, you can only arrive at your fourth birthday by getting enough sleep between now and then.

And with that, Kiddo #2 continued singing about how people can’t change, as though I’ve left and have been gone for quite some time.

Effectively, he’s dismissed me, as he often does when he’s finished speaking of the mundane with me; I think I need to get a dog so that at least someone in my house can’t be smarter than me. Like, a dumb dog, cuz the one we’ve got is also too smart, too. Ugh. Maybe I should get a pet rock.

Me: Ok, but why are you singing about people not changing?
Kiddo #2: Because they can’t.
Me: Well, that’s not really true. I mean, you have to want to change.
Kiddo #2: No. I don’t think you’re telling the truth.
Me: Well, like, if I want you to pretend you’re Spiderman, you can put on the costume and zoom around, but if YOU don’t want to be Spiderman, then when I leave, you’ll take off the costume and be Kiddo #2 again.
Kiddo #2: (pausing to consider this) Well, it’s like this: even if I put on the costume, I’m not the real Spiderman. And even if I want to be, I can’t be. Nope. People can’t change.
Me: (pausing to consider this) Um. Ok. But like, if you’re a mean person, and someone wants you to be nice and you decide to be nice because you want to be nice, too, then you’ve changed. But if you only want to be nice so that someone you like wants you to be nice, then you’re not going to change forever.
Kiddo #2: I think you need to go to bed.
Me: Yes. You, too.
Kiddo #2: I’ll stop singing about people not changing if you want.
Me: Just sing about whatever makes you happy or sad. Just sing.
Kiddo #2: See? No change, Mama.

If I were Zach Morris, I’d be looking directly into the camera right now in disbelief. Since I’m not, though, we’ll just assume I look like Captain Picard doing a facepalm and move on. Later that night, I was discussing this, and several other similar issues, with Husband. The breakdown of the argument basically looks like “Hey, our son is a free-spirit, and I don’t want to crush his spirit, BUT he’s got to listen to rules, even if he doesn’t think they apply to him in any way.”

The two of us have gone through all sorts of ways to get him to stay in bed at night, or to get him to listen to directions, or…

I spent, for example, 10 minutes looking for Kiddo #2 at Superstore because he saw something on the other side of the store, skipped off to investigate, and got so enthralled in whatever it was that he couldn’t hear me whisper-yelling his name.

And when he skipped on back, and I said “Kiddo #2! You can’t just wander off like that! It is not allowed. And it isn’t safe. And it scared me!” He looked at me with a “what’s the big fuss? We’re together now” look on his face and put his wee hand on my cheek and said, “But Momma, I needed to see something. Don’t worry. I’m back now.”

Seriously? Again, I don’t want to break his soul by suggesting there are ninjas out there who are begging to steal him whenever my back is turned (although Handmaid’s Tale plays out in my head every time I lose him, which does NOT help me stay calm.).

And, frankly, yelling at him, or giving him time-outs, or loud noises, simply does not do jack. He will go to a time-out, sit there, play or cry or whatever, and at the end of the time, he says what I need to hear (ie: why he was put there in the first place and how he will change to keep from going back there) and then continue on his merry way. If he was evil, this would be sociopathic behaviour. He’s quite kind to animals and stuff, though, so don’t worry that I’m enabling some super-serialkiller here.

He truly doesn’t think the reason he’s in time-out has anything to do with him. I think he thinks he’s there because I’m cross about SOMETHING so he says whatever he figures out he’s being wrongfully accused of, does his time, and gets out of jail as quickly as possible. …so that he can get back to whatever he was doing before he was so rudely interrupted by the adult in his life.

I think it must be like being Zach Morris– just hanging out, watching everything going on, doing stuff, having fun, getting into trouble but talking to the audience to let us know he’s not sweating it. He’s got it all figured out and can get out of any jam with his giant 1989 cell phone.

Kiddo #1 is NOTHING like this, of course. She gets in trouble, she bawls her head off (with or without Exorcist fit), comes out, professes her sorrow and apologizes, AND NEVER DOES IT AGAIN. I just keep wondering what the hell is going on here. I get that they’re different kids, but FRICK! This second one is KILLING ME.

So, after chatting it over all weekend, I arrived at work and was still puzzled by the whole thing. How do I get Kiddo #2 to listen to me/us without destroying who he is fundamentally? During a break, I discussed it with a few co-workers.

(Me: rehash, rehash, rehash. …without crushing his spirit… blar blar.) And then this friend of mine looked me in the eyes & said,
Friend: Well, so you’re saying that he’s a free-spirit. He isn’t malicious, or mean, just not concerned with the stuff that keeps everyone else in line. You said he doesn’t think it applies to him.
Right?
Me: Yes! (I’m clearly an expert explainer!)
Friend: And you don’t know how to keep him safe, and get him to stay in bed at night, and all that jazz? I mean, I have never met him, but maybe you should ask your mother?
Me: Why? What?
Friend: Well, I mean, I haven’t met your kiddo, but he sounds pretty lovable, and pretty funny, and pretty crazy and creative…so maybe your Mom could help you out?
Me: But why?
Friend: Uh, well, she might be able to help you out with Kiddo #2 because she’s already had to raise YOU once.

And then she dissolved into a fit of hysterical laughter. Also, for the record, did my mother.

My mother said, “Well you should talk to your father. He can get Kiddo #2 do anything just by explaining to him why he has to do it. In fact, he used to get you to do anything just by being there. Used to drive me crazy!”

And then my dad picked up the phone and asked what he was getting into trouble for. I said, “For just figuring everything out all the time. I want Kiddo #2 to listen to me and do what I say without crushing his spirit to get him there. But don’t bother telling me anything because you don’t get to be right all the time.”

My Dad: Oh, well you just have to tell him why. Like, I told  him he had to hold my hand on the way to the park and he wouldn’t do it. So I said, “Listen, Kiddo #2, you have to hold my hand because we’re walking close to the road and I wouldn’t want you to trip and fall into the road by mistake.”
Me: I tell him to hold my hand and he puts his hand on my cheek and says “It’s ok Momma, I won’t fall.” And I get angry and tell him to hold onto the cart instead, and even then he won’t.
My Dad: You need to tell him that he needs to hold onto the cart because the cars won’t be able to see him in the parking lot. He needs to understand the reason because when he leaves you at the cart, HE knows he can find you again- he thinks the problem is YOURS. It’s YOU having a fit, not him. He probably distracted you so much you forgot to get stuff at the store, right?

And my blood boils because my dang father is right. AGAIN. It’s enough to make a person MENTAL! I’m reduced to another epic facepalm. This is getting ridiculous.

Me: UGH! I’m so mad that you’re right. I forgot to buy pineapple last night because I was so distracted by Kiddo #2’s skippy-happy-lost stuff.
Dad: You’re really gonna hate this next part.
Me: Why?
Dad: Well, before your mother got off the phone, she wrote down on a piece of paper, “Get her to agree with you. And get her to say pineapple.”
Me: Wait. What? Whaaa?
Dad: I’m like The Amazing Kreskin, only better looking. But really, it’s not fair. You’re young. You’re sleep-deprived. And, you forget that we’ve already raised him once, but his name was Elizabeth.

Everyone’s a card-carrying Mensa member, mind-reading, comedian.