Home, Part V

I told you I'd write some more about this! This is a short, yet powerful installment in the continuing saga of SmallBoy's, PC's, and my mini-weekend in Michigan. I left a lot out because it was simply too difficult - you'll see where, so if something seems unexplained or just "hanging," that's why. If you haven't had a chance yet, you can read parts I, II, III, & IV of the Home Series by clicking on the links. When we left off, the three of us had just finished having pizza at our absolute favorite pizza place, outside of Chicago of course, and the weather was threatening our plans for a beach fire. We pick up here:

The leaves began to chatter. As the wind picked up, the chattering turned into a dull roar, and ultimately, the cacophony of the conversation was accompanied by the melody of the wind as it blew through the park. The raindrops developed into the percussion, keeping the rhythm of the storm constantly moving.

SmallBoy was bored. He desperately wanted to go back down to the beach to enjoy a fire and marshmallow roasting with G, E, and their family. He was beginning to fray at the edges and PC and I were able to see what would be forthcoming from our little man if the weather did not break, and soon. We tried to occupy him with drawing. That lasted about 5 minutes. We took out the cards, but he really didn’t want to do much with them except attempt to shuffle them bridge style. Unfortunately, his lack of experience at that led to several rounds of 52-card Pickup and a great deal of frustration. We were running out of ideas and SmallBoy was getting more and more upset by the rain as each second ticked off the clock, lost to the Land of What If.

This is when it hit, like a blast of thunder with no warning lightning, like the tidal wave crashing the shore, like the earthquake or the mudslide, or the volcano. This is when the months of exclusion from his father, the sadness, the frustration, the “what’s wrong with me”, the hurt, the rejection, the pain hit my sweet sweet little man all at one time. I felt helpless. I felt that nothing I could do would make him feel better.

“Noboy loves me.”

“Of course we love you, my Sweet. We all love you. I love you more than I can ever tell you. What did we use to say when you were little? I love more than the moon and the sky and all the stars in the heavens.”

“I’m bad.”

“What is it that makes you think you’re bad?”

“I just am. No one likes me. I can’t go with LargeBoy & Girl. I can’t go to the beach fire. I’m bored.”

Just like that. It continued on with our words of comfort and his words of distress, and PC and I worked to quell his emotions and assure him over and over that we love him. I found it interesting that he put together that he couldn’t go with his brother and sister, that he couldn’t go to the beach, and that he was bored. It was easy to tell that the rejection by his father seemed to just compound everything else. After he finally calmed down again, he understood perfectly well that there was nothing any of us could do about the weather and that it did not rain because the weather didn’t like him. We found a puzzle to do and PC, the world’s most incredible stepfather, went out in the dark, in the storm, to go find someone selling firewood so that we could have our own fire and make s’mores in the cottage.

My father-in-law has a great love of karaoke. He has two machines, one for home, and one for the cottage. While we waited for PC to return with the firewood, SmallBoy and I turned on the machine and found a disc of Disney songs. It wasn’t a karaoke disc, but we still sang along with the microphones. This REALLY brought SmallBoy’s engine back down, and it was good for the two of us to have some alone time at the most wonderful place on Earth. This disc became his favorite while we were there. PC and I would find him snuggled in the chair, reading the lyrics and the liner notes. He was happy there, so we would continue on doing whatever we were doing, confident that he was content.

Friday drew to a close and we laid out our plans for Saturday – rain or shine. Friday had been rough and we were all glad it was finally see it end. We got SmallBoy all snuggled into his bed, inside his sensory tunnel, of course. He was so exhausted from all that we had done that day, not to mention the emotional exhaustion that accompanied his catharsis, that he crashed within about 5 minutes. For the rest of the night, PC and I got to do something we had NEVER done – spend time together doing absolutely nothing together. PC and his guitar added their harmonies to the rain and the wind, while I sat and got addicted to Sudoku.