A friend laughed when I mentioned the latest thing Seth had gotten into that day (concrete powder). “You always have a story,” she said. And yes, I do, but thankfully whereas these stories used to always be about both boys, they are now more frequently about just Seth. So there is hope.

And here are a couple stories about Seth that show that he really does pay attention and has a good memory. Perhaps soon he will start actually making choices based on those two things.

Several weeks ago, we lost electricity for about half an hour. I was worried about our little chicks who were still tiny and using a heat lamp. Will, in his usual problem-solving manner, tried to come up with a solution. “I know!” he said. “We can go get the fan, and put it in front of the chicks and turn it on.” “Well, that won’t work Will.” I explained. “First of all, the fan makes you cold, not warm, and secondly, the fan uses electricity too.” Elise suddenly got a worried look and asked if the car used electricity. “Well, yes it does,” I answered. “But it makes its own electricity because it has a battery.” “So we can still go somewhere then?” she asked. “Yes, we can go in the car even without electricity in our house.” Elise and Will ran off to play or get ready to go, not sure which. I had promised them that if it got too much hotter in the house we’d go somewhere cool. Seth, who had been sitting quietly on the stairs in my work room during this whole exchange stayed behind. After a few moments of quiet pondering, he suddenly spoke. “Mom, plug a light into the car?” What a smart little kid. He had sorted out on his own, that the heat light needed electricity, which we didn’t have right now, and the car had a battery and made its own electricity. Why couldn’t we combine the two things and solve the problem?

Last week, we started school. As I sat down with Seth to do a little preschool with him, Will kept interrupting with instructions for Seth. “Will,” I finally said in exasperation. “You are not the teacher. I am.” Will just laughed and answered: “You are not a teacher, you are a mommy.” “I can be a teacher and a mommy too,” I replied. Will just seemed to think that was silly. Several days later as we were loading up the car, Seth started teasing me by calling me a “big man.” Figuring he was confused on the right wording, I corrected him by saying that no, I might be a big woman, but not a big man. “No,” laughed Seth. “You is a mommy teacher.”

So, you see. Seth really does pay attention. He just decides that getting into trouble is somehow much more fun than learning from his mistakes. I’m sure that will change . . . I HOPE that will change. Will has become a bit more responsible with age, but even he sometimes finds something to do that baffles my mind. Like last night, when he came out of his room after bedtime with his thumb securely stuck in a little hole he had found in his toy dump truck. As John and I worked for several minutes trying to release him from his predicament, I asked Will why he had stuck his finger in there. “I wanted to see if it wouldn’t get stuck,” he replied. And for some reason that makes perfect sense.