Well, OK, maybe not...but how cool is it that my son spent the day at a record store when most kids his age are in school?

bahahahhaha.

But, seriously...I think we're going to make a habit of this kind of inconvenient spending field trip. Not a necessity? Don't drive to get it. It took us at least an hour to get to the record store, and at least an hour and a half to get back. We actually had to go to two record stores to find Picaresque (although Waterloo had the vinyl version, and I was sorely tempted to shell out the dough for it, but...well I really don't have enough idle cash to start being a record collector.) Granted, we spent money on lunch, but we also spent a great deal of time walking around our fair city and talking about stuff. Coley actually walked the entire time without complaining, which is a miracle...

...and by the same miracle, he didn't plunge to a bloody death when he decided to crawl under a barrier and stand on the edge of a bridge that hangs 20-30 feet over a drainage ditch. Monk and I were walking hand in hand, and I turned around to the shock of NO COLEY. Of course, I did the absolute worst thing you are supposed to do when you realize that it's very possible that the barrier that is meant to keep people from plunging to their bloody death has only served as a delightful challenge to your barrier-busting 4-year old - I screamed. Yeah, that's great, lady! I'm really awesome around tightrope walkers, too.

Thankfully, Coley emerged unscathed and I instantly snatched him up in my arms. He was on the verge of tears anyway - sensing my distress. So I just held him close to me and explained to him, yet again, what barriers are for, and why they need to be acknowledged, respected and obeyed. Later, when I told this story to a horrified Pansy, she had the wisdom to point out that it was horribly illustrative of the way Coley seems oblivious to any sort of boundaries - physical and otherwise - and in fact I had spent most of the bus ride downtown attempting to get him to respect my personal boundaries with regard to not being leaned on and pinched (for those new to the world of Coley, he has a totally annoying habit of pinching on my upper arms that has driven me crazy since he was old enough to pinch and I was awake enough to be driven crazy by it). It's as if Coley exists to defy boundaries, which I'm sure will serve an important function in his life if we can teach him to use his power for good and not (scare and/or annoy mama to death) evil. After that ordeal was over and my heart started beating regularly, I bent down and made sure Coley understood that what he was getting from me was not anger but fear - and how very real the danger was. His little eyes brimmed with tears, and he quavered "I'm sorry, mama." and I said sternly, but gently "Look - don't be sorry...be safe! I love you." Monk responded to the situation by saying "You are SO not getting any lemonade now, Coley" in that sort of taunting exasperated tone that older brothers get when they are trying to disguise that they were a little freaked out, too. Later in the day we encountered a similar bridge with a similar barrier and we talked again about what the barriers were for, and why we don't explore the other side of them. I am really hoping he got the message this time. I mean, the kid is almost five, and he has been running up to the edges of things and scaring the piss out of me ever since he learned to walk. I used to be afraid that I was being overly fearful, but...no. I think he's just under-cautious. Truly. There's a little switch in there that hasn't been flipped, and I'm really worried that it won't GET flipped until he actually hurts himself.

(Of course, part of me is remembering the conversation about "bad parents" from last week and thinking defiantly "Fuck them. Fuck them all. They have no fucking clue what it is like to parent a child like Coley. None.")

In the end, we all survived. We got the CD and all in all we walked about 2 miles or so to and from buses. The kids had a grand old time running up and down the hill at whatever the fuck that park is by the library and across the street from the court house. We got to actually talk to people in the process of commuting and being out and about. Cars are such sterile little capsules. I really wish I had more time to avoid them. And Coley fell fast asleep on the bus on the way home, so we were spared his shenanigans for a scant 30 minutes or so.

When we got home, we listened to Picaresque about a hundred thousand times, Monk did some math and had some computer time, and by the time Steven came to get the kids, we were all quite happily sick to death of each other.

& Believe it or not, I think I'm actually sick of The Decemberists, too.

Or maybe I just need some sleep. Maybe that's it.