When in Rome

How I know I've been immersed in little-kid-culture for too long:

1. Alone, I ask myself while rummaging through the utensil drawer, my face the picture of focused concentration, "Hmmmm... where's Mr. Can-opener?"
2. I sometimes call my step-father 'daddy'.
3. My deepest conversations, though not without their unique flavour of eureka moments, progress like so:
-"Come here, you poopy poop with poop on your butt!" [I don't know where he learns this stuff]
-"Um, No, YOU have poop on your butt...." [I wanted to speak to him on his level, and understand his thinking.... um, yeah..]
-"Are you ever going to stop talking?"
-"Hey, I'll stop talking when you stop talking."
-"Good. Go back to British Columbia. You came here to play with me, and if you're not going to play with me, I don't know why you're here. Because you're not playing with me, and Mom said...."
-"Treat people with respect, and they will want to play with you."
-"I don't want to treat people with respect; I WANT YOU TO PLAY WITH MEEEEE!"
-"Bjorn, you can't always get what you want." [Oh God. I've become one of them. And so I add,] "If what you want is for someone to play with you and listen to you, then you must be the same way." [There. My parents never used THAT one on me, I think....]

Acting like a kid:
4. A hug and kiss make EVERYTHING all right.
5. I hypothesize that no matter how hard I am crying in bed, I can stop on a dime and in a crystal-clear angelic voice, say, "I want jungle juice, please" when asked by my Mommy what is wrong. [I haven't tried to confirm, myself, that this experiment's result is repeatable, though the data collected thus far inclines an auspicious feeling in my bosom that I'll be tasting some lovely jungle juice at about 22:14 EST today. Woohoo --! And no effort required, beyond a small investment in a new pair of lungs and earplugs for everyone but Mommy.]
6. I don't have to say what I mean, ever, and I still get my point across enough to feel satisfied with being understood.
7. Joking about Sonic the Hedgehog's character in one moment, sternly reprimanding someone for throwing toys in the next minute, then hugging the someone and telling him I love him in the moment following or overlapping the previous moments, flows naturally and requires no awkward inbetween patchwork. Kids take NOTHING personally. Well they do, but they also overgeneralize, so this is okay to leave in.

Things I picked up from little siblings' inner thoughts
8. I gasp when people in the outside world say the F-word. It is okay to tell on other people; not okay for them to tell on me.
9. I say the F-word just for the reaction, or when I think I can't help myself, as in during videogames when fighting the Boss.
10. Inviting a friend into the bathroom while I use the toilet seems perfectly okay, in fact, necessary.
11. There are no rules to follow unless I am winning at the game. If I am losing, I may restart the game as many times as I deem are fair to myself and that increase my chances at kicking your asssss. Also, if I lose the game, the fault lies squarely on the shoulders of any person I so choose in the room, or in the house, or in a book I am reading, for having had such a profoundly negative effect on the world in general.
12. When I say that I hate you, I really mean that I love you but that at that moment, I am convinced that your refusal to let me call my grandmother and tell her what you just said, means that you don't want to play with me.
13. I don't know what many words mean, but that doesn't stop me from using big ones I hear Mommy use, when I need to make a point, or from making up new ones to coerce my playmates into blugeronning (think French accent) with me near my Daddy's office [p.s. the word means 'sneak by', Bjorn tells me].
14. If I'm not having fun, there's no point to anything. [I like this one.]

;-p

Ohhh Bjorn and Liesl are such great kids. Most of the above is recalled from the glory days of Bjorn's younger years -- an era I like to refer to as the Tyranny of the Minor-ity. (You're supposed to laugh now. Or groan; okay.) xoxoxox