Ever notice how a 4-year-old’s voice is louder than 200 adults?
Several years ago, I returned home from a trip just when a storm hit, with crashing thunder and severe lightning. As I came into my bedroom about 2 a.m., I found my two children in bed with my wife, Karey, apparently scared by the loud storm. I resigned myself to sleep in the guest bedroom that night.
The next day, I talked to the children and explained that it was OK to sleep with Mom when the storm was bad, but when I was expected home, please don’t sleep with Mom that night.
They said OK.
After my next trip several weeks later, Karey and the children picked me up in the terminal at the appointed time. Since the plane was late, everyone had come into the terminal to wait for my plane’s arrival, along with hundreds of other folks waiting for their arriving passengers.
As I entered the waiting area, my son saw me, and came running shouting, “Hi, Dad! I’ve got some good news!”
As I waved back, I said loudly, “What’s the good news?”
Alex shouted, “Nobody slept with Mommy while you were away this time!”
The airport became very quiet, as everyone in the waiting area looked at Alex, then turned to me, and then searched the rest of the area to see if they could figure out exactly who his Mom was.
My three year old son had a lot of problems with potty training; and I was on him constantly.
One day we stopped at Taco Bell for a quick lunch in between errands. It was very busy, with a full dining room.
While enjoying my taco, I smelled something funny, so of course, I checked my seven month old daughter, and she was clean. The I realized that Matt had not asked to go potty in a while, so I asked him and he said, “No.”
I kept thinking, “Oh Lord, that child has had an accident and I didn’t have any clothes with me.” Then I said, “Matt, are you sure you did not have an accident?”
“No,” he replied.
I just knew that he must have, because the smell was getting worse. Sooooo…. I asked one more time, “Matt, did you have an accident?”
Matt jumped up, yanked down his pants, bent over and spread his cheeks and yelled…. “SEE, MOM, IT’S JUST FARTS!!!”
While 100 people nearly choked to death on their tacos, he calmly pulled up his pants and sat down to eat his food as if nothing happened. I was mortified!
Some kind elderly people made me feel a lot better, when they came over and thanked me for the best laugh they had ever had!!!
Another old gentleman stopped us in the parking lot as we were leaving, bent over to my son and said:
“Don’t worry son, my wife accuses me of the same thing all the time… I just never had the nerve to make the point like you did.”