ON A RECENT SATURDAY morning, while chasing a couple of grandgirls out of my office, I recalled a similar moment 20 years earlier involving a couple of grandsons. It was my wife’s fault, really. She used to spoil them rotten. In her eyes they could do no wrong. Which meant I was the one who had to get ‘stern’ when stern was called for.
Anyway, on that long-ago weekend, while Gran slept in and I made toast, the three-year-old discovered my computer. He discovered that, by running in and banging the ‘delete’ key he could spoil his older brother’s game – which was FUN! And he discovered that, by sneaking up when his brother wasn’t watching, then hitting the ‘power’ button, he could crash the entire system – which was EVEN MORE FUN!
By this stage, the dog was barking, the kids were yelling, and all hell was breaking loose. So I put on my sternest face, and warned the little offender that if he so much as LOOKED at the computer, he’d be sent back to bed with no breakfast!
I plonked him down in the kitchen, and buttered the now-soggy toast. But two minutes later, I caught my grandson standing there … his pyjamas around his ankles … peeing on the floor! Aarrgghh!
Yes, he was only three. And yes, he was probably bursting. (He was always bursting!) But he was also punishing me, and I knew it. He was teaching me a lesson … warning me, next time, not to spoil his fun!
So there on the spot I did what you’re not allowed to do these days: I slapped his bare bum – and sent him, bawling, into the waiting arms of Gran.
When I stomped past in search of a mop, I overheard him telling on me: “Granddad breaked my liddle heart!” he sobbed (or pretended to sob). “He breaked my liddle heart!”
He got over it, of course. Half-a-sob later, he was sitting up in bed, stealing Gran’s toast and demanding a Milo – his liddle heart all healed!
Amazing, eh?
JOHN COONEY, GRAPEVINE’S FOUNDER, REPORTS THAT THIS SAME LITTLE GRANDSON (NOW AN OVERGROWN ADULT) HAS FATHERED A DAUGHTER WHO’S A CHIP OFF THE OLD BLOCK, THE SPITTING IMAGE OF HER DAD! BITOVAWORRY, THAT …
