The Little Dictator

Just look at this kid.

Is he not darling? Does he not look like he could charm the pants off anyone?

Ha! Don't be fooled.

While certainly charming (he greets strangers not only with "Hi!" but also "how are you?" all run together and intoned more like a statement than a question: "howareyou.") he is a little dictator. I swear the other day he wanted milk and I had to go to the kitchen to get it, because silly me! I do not carry milk around with me, and of course that didn't go over well at all. So I'm in the kitchen and he's at the doorway hanging over the child gate, as I hurry as FAST as I can because GOD FORBID he WAIT for something and I swear the child was hollering NOW! NOW! NOW! at me. What the everloving hell? He is not even two yet! Where did he learn that? No, seriously. It is not like we are teaching him this stuff. No really.

The kid has always known what he wants and what he doesn't want. From day one. And there seems to be a lot more of the latter than the former these days.

Tonight we met E downtown for dinner, after which I strapped the baby on in my new Moby wrap (thank you aunties A & E and uncle W) and we took a stroll down to the waterfront. It's the Rose Festival in Portland right now, which every year I manage to ignore. Seriously I have lived here six years now and have never "done" the Rose Festival. But tonight on a whim we decide to go in--this is going to make us sound like terrible snobs--not so much to have fun, but as observers. Kinda like you'd go to the zoo to see the animals. Carnivals are just not our thing I guess. But now we have a two year old and we thought, what the hey, we'll show him a good time, he likes shiny things, right?

So the first section is all displays. Much hawkage of crap going on. You would not believe the crap being hawked down there. And I don't mean the crappiness of the crap is notable (although there is some crappy crap down there fo' sho'), I mean you would not believe what they are selling down there. Like seriously, new siding for your home, and cookware, and travel packages. At a carnival? It was just so weird to see that, I mean, who's the target market? Joe Carnival?

So we pass through all the crap-booths looking for something Loo can do (besides run around unhindered by us like he wants to--as if). Finally we come to a petting zoo and pony ride. Loo experienced a petting zoo and pony ride last week with his nanny, so he gets a load of the ponies and starts going off about "I want pony. Ride pony. Ride pony. I ride pony." Well of course I'm letting my kid ride a pony, we're here, right? It'll be cute. So we pay our $5 for a ticket. We just miss getting Loo seated on a pony right away (we were right behind the last little girl allowed in) and of course that was too much for him. Two-year-olds aren't so big on delayed gratification. Meltdown, but understandable. So E takes Loo for a little spin around the immediate area so he doesn't notice so much that he's not on a pony. Soon enough, the ride's over and everyone clears out and they're ready for another set of kiddos, so we bring Loo back and he picks a little white pony and they put him on. And he's petting the pony and all happy and they go around once and as I'm fumbling with my camera-phone to capture the moment, Loo announces "All done!" and that was that. "All done," not like "I'm scared and want off" but more like "Okay, I get what this is about, been there done that, moving on." Kid is DONE with a pony ride after once around? Okaaaaaay. First clue that he's a little "different".

So we move on down the fairway to the part with the rides. Carnivals sure have come a long way from when I was growing up. Admittedly, I grew up in BFE, but still. The rides they've got going on down there! Stuff you used to have to go to an actual amusement park to ride. We pass up all the exciting stuff and we're looking for the kiddie stuff, anything Loo could ride. Finally, all the way at the end we come to the kiddie stuff. And he's too small for all of it. They've got signs everywhere that you have to be two to ride (in addition to the height requirements) but I figured we could *cough* work that part out *cough* since Loo is pretty tall ("two? sure, he's two....months shy of two years old cough cough"). But everything also has a height requirement and he's tall but he's not that tall. The only thing we could find was this humungo slide that you climb up and up and then go down it sitting on a little wool blanket. They said Loo could ride down on E's lap, even though he wasn't tall enough (we did lie when they asked how old he was. I know, we're evil) but we had to go buy tickets for it. So we did, and came back, and up up up E and Loo climb to ride down the slide. And I'm watching and they get up there and Loo pitches a fit. He's up there head-butting E and thrashing around and I'm laughing because it's just so LOO and it's just so psycho two-year-old and it's just our life right now. We walk this kid allll the way down the fairway looking for something he can do, and we LIE about his age and we buy the freaking tickets and E climbs up this huge thing with him and it's not good enough. Something didn't go his way (perhaps E restrained him from falling off? you think?) and he's just gonna throw down, right here, right NOW. I could not help but laugh. It was just too perfect.

So I'm not even sure E's gonna let him ride down, I'm waiting to see if they're gonna have to climb down instead of ride. But they go through with it and down they come. Loo was grinning ear to ear and wanted to ride again immediately. We were going to let him but WE DIDN'T DO IT FAST ENOUGH so he freaked out again. Thrash, cry, scream. Abort mission. We strapped him into his stroller and headed back.

On the way back past the ponies and petting zoo, Loo perks up and wants to Ride Pony again. Instead we decide to do the petting zoo. This is really largesse on our part--the kid should be going home, he's toast by now. But we're gluttons for punishment. So E takes Loo into this awesome petting zoo with, I am not kidding, Llamas and baby deers all spotted like Bambi and a million goats and lambs and Loo takes a look around and then turns around and only wants to open and shut the freaking gate.

Gonnnnnngggg! We lose. We try, we really try to show him a good time. He just marches to a different drummer I guess.

After we put him to bed tonight (and as we were drinking our "recuperation beers" together), we joked how Loo is going to be a teenager, making out with his first serious girlfriend and she's going to want him to kiss her and he's just going to be fascinated with hooking and unhooking her bra. And we laughed and laughed, because it's so true--he probably will.

Comments

[Kate W.]

That is so funny, yet so true! My husband was very irked at last years Easter Egg Hunt when our daughter only wanted one egg in her basket that I swear, he "trained" her all year. "what do we do at the egg hunt? We get em!Get em! Get em!" I could have cared less that she only had one egg...
This year she managed 6!!!

[nonlineargirl]

I'm impressed that you braved the rose festival with the kids. It is so chaotic, even without the willfull insanity of a 2 year old.

[Deb]

We have lived here for 3 yrs and I almost made it this year.....It is so overwhelming with kids and traffic for me!

My now 15 yr old son used to play with my hair while nursing as a toddler. We joked he was going to grow up and be uncontrollable attracted to big breasted women with long hair and not understand the reason! No girlfriend as of yet, so we shall see!

[honey]

uh, yeah... we go to the zoo and all he wants to do is go up and down any set of steps he can find. Look at the animals? Not so much. BTDT. When we go to the playground, he just wants to walk around, I practically have to trick him to go down the slide... this is NOT my favorite age.

And I agree w/ NLG, you're brave to take the boys to the Rose Festival, I wouldn't do it if you paid me!

Did you know Attached To Baby is/was having a 15% off moving sale? Did you see your namesake GypsyMamma wrap that I told you about?

[Ama]

AH, yes...and welcome to the wonderful time called Hell at two...we are two weeks from three and I will be making my own wish when the candle is blown out that my child no longer gets to act like a two year old...the rules (somewhere) must state that once they turn three, they are not allowed to act like they are two...i am going to read over the rules again before the birthday just to see...good luck for next year or so...