Why daddy, why?

Dear Js,

Mama and I have collapsing with more wounds to lick at the end of each day. Two days ago, J found his favorite word.

One morning before school:

“WHY?”
Because the train is not here anymore. We cannot see it if it’s not here.
“WHY?”
Because the train came from that station, and went that way, far away. The people got in the train, and the train took them to work.
“I want to see it.”
You can’t see it, because it’s not here anymore. We can see it another time.
“I want to see it NOW.”
We can’t see it now, because the train is not here anymore.
“WHY?”
Because trains don’t come all the time. You can only see it when they come by. Sometimes we can see them, sometimes we can’t.
“WHY?”

(Then later… it was the garbage truck. After it was done with our street, it drove off to other houses.)

“I want to see it.”
We can’t see it anymore because it went away.
“WHY?”
Because it has to help every house pick up the garbage bin, and dump it in the back.
“I want to see it NOW”
We have to take turns. The garbage truck has to go one at a time, from one house to another house to another house. Like the delivery truck.
“Why is it like the delivery truck?”
>__< Eventually he understood that the garbage truck only comes on Fridays and it empties our garbage bins, and Sam and Sydney's, and Han and Mins, and Auntie Louissa's, and... Then on the way to school, he said "SLOW DOWN DADDY! You're going too fast!" The speedometer said 40mph. I said, "I'm not going too fast!" He said, "I don't want to go fast daddy you are going too fast!" >__< ! Then he said, "Cement mixer!" It was next to us at the traffic light. "It's moving!" Yes, it's mixing the cement in the barrel. I asked him, "Is that cement mixer going to school?" He said, "No." Is the cement mixer going to work?" He said No. "Cement mixer is going to his office. I want to tell mama about the orange cement mixer on the way back." We stopped by to see the white truck the roofers parked on the side again. Then we went to Starfish. GOOD MORNING FRIENDS. There were no friends. Where are friends? They went for potty trip. There was a mess at the table, I swept it away. J sat himself down and I gave him half a banana. He ate it and I gave him another half. Then the potty train came back. Jayden walked over and said "Hiiiiiii......" I said Hi Jayden. Jayden asked, "Why is Joshua not wearing his bathing suit?" I said he is. Look! He has his orange swimming trunks. "Why is Joshua holding a ball?" Because it's Kimi's ball and Kimi is his doggy. "Why is Joshua holding Kimi's ball?" Because they were playing together earlier. "Why is Joshua wearing a hat?" >__<* I said goodbye to J and hugged him and kissed him and said I love you. He was confident, looking around, eating his banana, drinking his milk. It's like this EVERY MINUTE of EVERY DAY now. WHY DADDY WHY? WHY MAMA WHY? WHY? The other day, you asked, "What was that sound?" I said "I don't know... sometimes I just DON'T KNOW." You didn't skip a beat: "Why don't you know? Why?" IT DOESN'T END. Suddenly, I figured it out.

Have you heard of the Stanford Marshmallow Experiments? They showed that self control (delayed gratification) in children is a strong predictor of success in life. Children who could resist marshmallows placed in front of them did better in just about every category than those who couldn’t, when they became adults.

As you can imagine, parents jumped all over this. They whipped self control into their kids to increase their chances of going to Stanford or becoming a surgeon.

I think self control tactics help to some extent, but I think they’re missing the point. I think self control is just a symptom of a more basic quality in a child that makes him or her successful.

I think it’s a case of correlation does not imply causation.

Here’s what I mean. When there’s a fire, the more firemen fighting a fire, the bigger the fire is observed to be. The incorrect conclusion is: firemen make fires bigger. But no, it’s that bigger fires draw out more firemen.

In the same way, maybe self control isn’t what makes children successful. Maybe something else causes self control, and this something else is ALSO what creates success.

And I think I figured out what this “something else” is. It’s related to your WHYs.

Because, as I was thinking to myself, “Boy, this sure is annoying,” I wondered how other parents handled this. Would they answer every question? No. A common solution these days is to throw the kid an iPad. (Which is essentially a distraction grenade.) Maybe slip some Tylenol in her mouth. That will stop the questions. Sure. But… the questions don’t get answered.

And when the questions don’t get answered, you don’t understand. And when you don’t understand, you get frustrated. It’s hard to have self control when you don’t understand.

In other words,
If Self control → Success
And Understanding → Self control
Then Understanding → Self control → Success
Therefore, by transitivity: Understanding → Success

See? If this is true, then self control is just a by-product. The ultimate goal then is to help a child understand.

Because if a child has the tools to communicate and understand the world around him, you can teach him or her anything. Including self control.

So, for now, this is what we must endure. We must answer your questions. Every extra ounce of pain we bear means you’ll get a better shot at a happy life. That’s the idea anyway.

But between the two of us, mama definitely tries harder and is more patient. As tired as she was, here she is putting you to sleep:

Speaking of sleep, J, we’ve had some interesting conversations with you at bedtime in the last week:

1) You explained what Love is. As mama put you to bed, she said “I love you J.” You shouted, “And daddy too!” Then you went on to tell mama about all the things we do together. “Daddy takes me to school. We go to a different parking lot. We go to the end of the wall. We see the train and the digger, and the crane with a basket. You went on and on until you fell asleep. Love is an abstract concept. You somehow made the association that Love has to do with people doing things with you that make you happy.

2) Routines help you sleep. I turned on your white noise giraffe. You shouted, “NO! I want sleepy sounds!” I had pushed the wrong button, which made wave sounds instead of sleepy sounds (crickets).

3) Your inanimate friends are handy. You turned on your monkey light. I said you have to say good night to monkey. You said, “I don’t want to say good night to monkey.” I said if you don’t say good night to monkey then he will get sleepy… and his eyes will close like this (I blink, rub my eyes, then close them)… and then he cannot see… and If he cannot see he cannot play. But if he sleeps, when he wakes up he will be awake (I open my eyes wide and your eyes get big) and happy! You turned monkey light off and leaned for me to put you in bed.

And speaking of funny conversations…

On waving: For a while, you didn’t have good timing with your waving. We’d say, “Wave J.” And you’ll wave 5 minutes later, after finally processing the situation. Now, you’ll wave to the garbage truck driver, the train conductor, the mailman… even the other day: You were on your bike and you waved suddenly. I looked at mama and mama looked at me. We asked, “Who are you waving to J?” You said, “The treeeeeees….”

On growing up: You: “When I grow taller I can go up high and touch the power line, like the man (filming the football game at the stadium).” Me: “You need a crane to go up high like the man.” You: “No I don’t. I will use my feet.”

On “something”: I said, “There’s something in there.” You said, “That’s not something, that’s a …” and paused. I said, “When you don’t know the name, it’s called ‘something’.” You thought “something” referred to something particular before. (I don’t know what>) But you’re starting to understand that “something” is a general term.

On equilibrium: For fun, I made unstable towers with you the other day. I said, “It’s unstable! It can fall easily! It’s not stable!” You giggled and tipped all my towers over. Then today, you made mama laugh (and also shake her head at me): “Unstable things, I’m going to make a house of unstable things!”… while playing with his blocks hehe.

It came in handy on our walk today. You tried to sit on the top of your bike seat’s back with your feet on the seat. I said that’s unstable! You could fall easily! Like the unstable tower! I can’t move if you’re unstable. You sat down.

That brings me back to my point today. Self-control doesn’t come from self-control tactics. It comes from understanding. I believe that the more dots you give a kid by helping him or her understand the world, the more dots he has to make connections. And the more tools you have to shape the right behavior.

Remember the “End of the Wall” and the train station? You like reading the cars in the way there:

J1 pix!

J2 pix!

And to wrap it up, here are this week’s daycare drop-offs, in case you’re wondering how you’re progressing…

Back of truck, people on roof

When we pulled up into the lot, he said he wanted to see the back of the truck. I asked where is the truck? He said there! I still couldn’t see any truck, but I walked him to where you pointed anyway.

Where is the truck? THERE! I looked closer, and the truck was parked behind the side of the school, next to the fence, with just 2 feet of truck peeking out. Oh! A truck! I said look the truck has a ladder. The construction workers use that to climb up on the roof.

I traced the line of red flags along the edge of the roof, and stepped back to show him the men working up top. Then we went in. He wanted to stay to watch the back of the truck, but thankfully there was a man working inside so I could say, “Look, this man is fixing the roof here.”

Then in the playground, we turned around to see 4 men pounding on the roof. We watched them for a while, then step into Starfish and said GOOD MORNING FRIENDS. I guess we were a little late. Most of the class was out for potty time and there was no snack.

He gave me his cars to put away in his cubby, and I put his things away. Then Ms Ditte asked can you help me throw these away? Jaya ran over and said “I WANT TO!” So Joshua got some strips of paper and Jaya got some and they wandered to the trash can to throw them away.

There were crayons on one table and blocks on another. Max came by pushing the big yellow metal truck from the other day. I picked up a crayon and started drawing. J saw me and joined in with a brown crayon. I drew the back of the truck, the parking lot, the red flags, and the school and the men working on top. He pulled himself a chair and sat down. He drew lines on his paper and then on mine. Jaya joined us too.

Then I did goodbye routine. I ended by saying I’ll come back after work. Please wait for me. He said “YA.” I said I love you and left and he kept his focus on his drawing.

The day I lost my patience. Mama took you to school instead: I went to work without you today. You had a tantrum and didn’t want pants, you didn’t want mama to leave, you didn’t want shoes, etc. I said I had to go. If you weren’t ready, I had to leave. I waited, then got tired of waiting. So I left. Mama wrote to tell me how it went…

So after talking to J a lot, he calmed down a little after having been crying the whole time while I changed and fed Julia. He wanted to be carried upstairs so I brought them both up and put him on the bed and Julia in the bassinet just in case he started flailing or something heh.

I talked to him a while longer and he started to settle down. I took Julia out and asked him to keep her company and take care of her while I got ready. He tried to put her socks on and asked for help when he couldn’t. He put his own shoes on and asked me to park in the far lot, I gave him your usual explanation and it worked.

We left and he ate his cereal otw there. He wanted to go a different way so I did. We got there and there was a huge green truck in the closer lot, they are doing something to the roof. J didn’t want to go close, I think the noise on the roof scared him a little bit. Inside it was circle time already, Jayden came to say hi and joshua helped me put his lunch on the table, said he was going to eat it all.

I walked him over to circle time so he stood by the couch to listen to the story. I said I had to go and hugged him tight, said I love you and he asked me to please pick him up early so I am going to try and pick him up before cooking dinner. I smiled as I went out the door and he briefly looked at me as I stepped out….

“I disappeared it.”

On the way to school, J said he wanted to see the tow truck. I said let’s look for it. If we’re lucky, we will see it.

I thought he was referring to the tow trucks we see on the street. But he wasn’t. I realized which tow trucks he was referring to later…

Because when we reached school, he said, “If we’re lucky, the cars will bump together outside our school and we can see the tow trucks.” Err… yes. That’s right. It was too complicated to fix that right there, so I left it at that.

He wanted to park in the far lot. I explained again that we’ll park in the closer one if we have space. When I stopped to turn into the CCLC lot, he concluded, “There is space in the closer parking lot today.” I guess he can see everything through his mirror in the back.

I got out of the car and I showed him all the spaces. And that we park here so we can go fast to the door. He dinged the bell by the door.

GOOD MORNING FRIENDS. His eyes were drawn to a big yellow metal truck the size of the blue “car” he sits on at home. It was on the train table. 5 kids were each trying to pull it toward themselves, so it was like the train table became an Ouija board with possessed kids moving the piece around. Lazaros seemed the most upset, so I figured it was his. J said he wanted to play with it. I said I think it’s Lazaros’. We have to wait for our turn.

So he helped me put away his things. There was no snack today for some reason. The 3 teachers were huddled and whispering. Not sure if it’s about the truck or something else happened. J said pick me up daddy. I picked him up. Ms Gina said if you guys want to play with the truck you have to clean up first. They all ran to clean up, except Laz. Then Ms Ditte went to take the truck away and put it on top of the cubbies where they couldn’t reach. She said to herself, “this is metal, it’s too dangerous anyway.”

Meanwhile, Natalie snatched a car away from a new Indian boy, and he ran to me. I said there’s another white truck on the floor. He went to pick it up. I looked for something for J to do. There were magnetic drawing boards. He gave me his white truck to put away. The Indian boy wanted to grab it from me. I said this is Joshua’s truck. I walked to the cubby and he followed. I said this is Joshua’s truck, I’m going to put it in the cubby. After I put it in, he gave up.

Back at the table, I picked a drawing board to join J. I drew a car. He wanted me to draw a long train. I drew the conductor’s hand out the window and he said “He’s waving to me! I’m waving to him!” He drew a train too. Arjun came over and wanted to take his board. J defended. Each time Arjun reached out, J pushed his hand away. He didn’t say anything. He just kept his gaze down while trying to draw, and each time Arjun’s hand came out, J deflected it.

Then Arjun tried to take mine. I said this is mine, you can have those over there. He tried again, and I repeated what I said. I handed him a board. He took it. Then Natalie came over to show us her baby. I asked her what her baby’s name was. She said “Her name is baby Bbbahbeuh.” Baby Bbbahbeuh? “Yeaa…” and she smiled and giggled and ran away. Jayden came over and said, “WHAT ARE YOU MAKING?” I said I’m making a flower. Each time I drew something, J would clear my board and “I DISAPPEARED IT”.

Ms Ditte yelled, “who wants to paint?” Jayden and Jaya said me me me me and ran away. Ms Gina gave J a chair to sit on to draw. I asked him where he wanted to go this evening. He said “The end of the wall.” I said we’ll go when I come home from work. Mama and Julia will pick you up. Please don’t go without me. Seeing that he was okay, I hugged and kissed and said goodbye.

When I looked back, his back was still to me and he didn’t turn to look. I saw Ms Ditte smiling at J. She was standing by the sink observing. Then she said “Bye Aaron!” Then Ms Gina and Ms Marissa said bye too.

Confident

Traffic was heavy this morning. Good news is J got to see some cement mixers and trucks.

I braked slightly hard at one point, and he asked, “Daddy did you go too fast?” I laughed and said yes I did. Then sometimes when I stop he asks, “Are you waiting for the traffic light?” So I explained that there are many cars today. And we have to go slow and take turns.

He asked if the closer parking lot is full today (instead of saying “I want to go a different way”). I said let’s see. As it turned out, it was full. So we went to the other lot. We got out and saw that the school was having orientation or something. He asked what was going on. I said I didn’t know, and just described the scene to him – “there’s a table, there are balloons, yellow, blue, and people standing on the steps.”

Then on the way into CCLC, he pointed at the lot and said, “This parking lot was full,” and then, “Daddy, I want to go ding ding!” And he dinged the bell beside the main door.

Bumped his head on the lantern and he giggled. GOOD MORNING FRIENDS. 5 kids were wrestling a big beach ball (it was taller than them). Then I saw Natalie bite someone on the shoulder. He said owww and then Natalie went to bite the ball. Not sure what’s up with Natalie.

J sat down for snack. I asked Ms Gina if he could have the raisin bread and she said yes. Then Ms Ditte said that’s for the teachers. Oops. J had rice crispies and fruit.

I saw Jayden and Natalie fighting over a box. Ms Ditte’s method of resolution is this: she snatches the box away from both of them. Then Jayden and Natalie start walking away. The Ms Ditte explains that the box is big enough for both of them, etc…

I said when he’s done he can play with the boxes with the other kids at the circle, or the big ball, or with the play do in the back with Jaya.

I sat down with him on a little chair at the table for a little, then I said I have to go to work and said goodbye. He fussed a little, but he calmed himself down fast and he accepted what I said. I waved by to him on the way out and blew him a kiss and he was confident enough to look at me.

In time for snack time

When I peeked in from outside, he was looking through the window and I waved again and touched the lantern.

Love,

Dad

P.S. – J, now that you’re talking more in school, your teachers say you’re goofy. They don’t have to tell me. I know. I wonder if you’re going to stay goofy.

And you understand dreams now. When mama greets you in the morning, she asks, “Did you sleep okay?” One day, you said, “I had a good dream mama.” Then you rambled on about the sidewalk, the car, me driving, …

By the way, when mama picks you up at school, she likes to wait by the fence to watch you play. Then one of your friends will tell you she’s here. You’ll run to the fence yelling MAMA MAMA MAMA and mama will bend down. As a joke, she asked you to kiss her cheek through the fence. But you like it, so that’s your thing now. You run to her and kiss her cheek through the fence. And then she picks you up.

P.P.S. – J2, you’re getting big. As big as mama’s friend’s 6 month old baby. But you’re warming up to me. You look around for me when you hear my voice. And when I pick you up, you don’t kick me in the nuts and flail anymore. Today, you actually relaxed in my arms. And you look at me with the sweetest face and give me the cutest smiles. Then when I smile back, you flap your arms and legs like a ladybug.

Mama says it’s interesting how you don’t cry at night when you are hungry. You just snuggle into mamas chest until she feeds you.

You are getting stronger too. You want to crawl.

P.P.P.S. – In case you’re wondering if we’re good parents, here’s proof:

Can you believe ALL this happened in the last two weeks since I last wrote???

P.P.P.P.S. – After my suggestion, mama has started writing to both of you too! But I don’t know where! One day, she’ll get to read what I wrote to you. And I’ll be excited to get to read hers. I hope you will be as excited as me.