Children in the Room

            You could tell there had been children in the room. If the Legos strewn haphazardly across the floor wasn’t enough of a giveaway, the tiny shoes lying on their sides five feet apart would be the next clue. Cardboard books littered the ground, mixed in between the Legos. A doll and a toddler sized rocking chair joined the chaos.

            But the biggest clue was the screaming of the two little boys who were, in fact, still in the room, and the slightly crazed look in their mother’s eyes. The younger boy, nearly one year old, had a slight cold, and was suspected of having yet another ear infection. The older boy, two and a half years old, had been sound asleep when he had first gotten to his grandmother’s house, but the mess that covered the family room only appeared after he awoke.

            The boys’ aunt, who was supposed to be writing, was distracted by how cute, but loud these two were. She carefully disconnected the clingy younger one from his mother’s arms during dinner, so the mother would have a chance to eat in piece. This ended in her arm becoming sore after a while because the only way to keep him happy while away from his mother was to bounce him around and swing him upside down. She couldn’t help but laugh, though, as he became fascinated at one point, with moving her head up and down. He would push up on her chin and then giggle incessantly when she dropped her head back in place, each time pulling a funny face. His giggle was contagious and she soon couldn’t stop herself from laughing in pure joy every time she heard it.

            If the younger one was clingy and giggling, the older one could only be described as difficult. He wanted cookies, but he wanted to go into the pantry to get them himself. He wanted to play with his younger brother, but his idea of playing with him was to hit him in the chest and grab the front of his clothes. The adults all knew that he was just getting out of hand, but that didn’t stop them from getting upset with him.

            At the same time, he was doing such crazy things, and saying such silly things, that they couldn’t be mad at him for too long.

            “Do you want some cookies?”

            “Cookies? Okay.”

            “Are you hungry?”

            “Hungry? Okay.”

            Everything was ‘okay’. That was, apparently, his way of saying yes.

            Perhaps the most hilarious part of the evening, however, was when the younger brother stole a ball that the older brother had.

            “Hey! Give that back!”

            The older brother retrieved his ball back without too much effort, and went back to playing unperturbed. It probably shouldn’t have been as funny as it was, but the older brother stole things from the younger one so often that this particular payback struck us all as amusing.

            Eventually, the aunt was able to get back to writing, although the distractions still made it difficult to truly concentrate. She couldn’t blame her nephews, however. She knew it wasn’t their fault they were just so darn cute!