(True to summer in Alberta, there certainly has been A LOT of weather lately. Here’s another throwback to the what the weather was like in my yard twenty years ago…)

Some days it seems like my children go through more emotional ups and downs than a Richard Simmons infomercial. Often the grouchy quotient is elevated by a bad cold and/or not enough sleep. But sometimes, in young families, I find we’re still all just trying to get used to each other.

Throw another kid into the mix and things can really get messy. My children love to have friends over. The best thing is when a family with about the same number of kids comes over and mine pair off with theirs. But the other day, just one friend came over and this particular day, it emphasized the battle lines. 

It all started out innocently enough. Gil, my oldest son, had the great idea of playing baseball. Of course, Mom had to dampen that idea by nixing the use of the real baseball bats since I wasn’t able to supervise at the time. Maybe it’s just me, but there’s something about three and five-year-olds swinging a Louisville Slugger with reckless abandon that I have a problem with.

So, they settled on just playing catch. Gil doled out the ball gloves and, true to form of the oldest child, began to give everyone orders of where to stand, how to hold their glove, who throws to who, and so on. As I looked up from vacuuming out the van, I first noticed Simon, the three-year-old standing about one hundred feet away from Tim, to whom he was supposed to throw the ball. So, I did what no mother is supposed to do. I interfered. All I did was make the suggestion to Gil that maybe there was no possible way that Simon ever in a million years could throw that far. Simon apparently had more faith in his big brother’s direction and proceeded to run the first ninety feet towards Tim before he hurled the ball at him with all his might. He still came short three feet.

Everything went downhill from there as the three younger players suddenly lost all interest in “organized” sports. Gil declared mutiny and informed the younger tribe that he was running away from home. At first, they weren’t too concerned since kids are used to each other’s dramatics.

But then Gil crossed the fence and Tim got mighty upset with this turn of events. Perhaps it was genuine concern for his big brother’s welfare or maybe he was worried about losing a good Nintendo partner, but he felt the acute need to report Gil’s departure to me at the top of his lungs. I yelled out to Gil to remember that he couldn’t cross the fence that bordered the back of our property and he replied that he merely intended to stay out in the bush forever. Much to Timmy’s dismay, I returned to removing an entire sandbox from my van.

After ten minutes of Tim keeping a not-so-silent vigil at the barbwire fence, Gil suddenly decided that forever was a long time if he had to listen to his brother whine for him to please, please, please come back. He stepped out of no-man’s land and to Timmy’s relief, agreed not to play baseball but to ride bikes instead.

With the incentive of the younger friend’s ability to ride his brand-new two-wheeler, Gil that day learned how to ride a training-wheel-free bike, after a few good pushes from his mom. The boy who convinced himself he could never learn to ride a bike was all sunshine and laughter, a sharp contrast to the gloomy boy he left behind in the bush. And I just marveled at how quickly the weather could change in my yard.