Bacchus and Christopher

A few nights ago, Chrsitopher's friend Bacchus slept over. His real name is something Biblical, so I decided to change it to something pagan for good measure. He and Christopher both go to the same school, which is a Christian school that, in the interest of privacy, I will call St. Zeus's Academy for Future Gods and Goddesses.  Bacchus is a small, skinny kid with black-framed glasses, and I swear I will marry this boy off to one of my daughters if I have any say in the matter. Not only is he incredibly smart and makes good grades, which I attribute to the power of his glasses, but when I picked up he and Christopher in aftercare, we had the following conversation:
"Hey, Bacchus," I said, strolling into the gym, which is where they keep the Future Gods and Goddesses of aftercare. "You ready to come to our house? Do you have all your stuff?"
"Yes. And I have the one thing that every sleep over needs..." he knelt in front of his school bag and reached inside. "Duct tape!" he said, brandishing the silver roll.
"Uh...what are we going to use that for?"
"I don't know. Just in case something comes up."

This enthralled me. What could come up that was duct tape worthy? A flat tire? A broken Wii remote? Thirst? I spent most of that evening asking Bacchus if we needed the duct tape.
"Bacchus, I'm parking the car. Do we need the duct tape?"
"No, Miss Genevieve."
"Hey Bacchus, I'm out of butter for the pancakes. Do we need duct tape?"
"No, Miss Genevieve. That would be gross."
"I suppose. What if I broke a plate? Could we use it then?"
"Yeah, I think so. Is there a broken plate?"
"No. Not yet. You're being too careful with it, look, it won't break that way. Don't set your plate on the table. Set it on the dog."
"I don't think she'd like that."
"Ooooh! Fine. Keep your duct tape, I don't need to see it in action."
"Christopher," he said to my son, who has had nine years to get used to me. "Is your mom always like this?"
"Yes," Christopher said.
"Ok. I like it," said Bacchus, pushing his glasses back.
That's how this kid talks. Monotone, even when he's excited, and especally when he's serious. Which is a lot.
Take for instance, our conversation about slang. He and I have a similar distaste for the term "brain fart."
"My nanny says it when she forgets something. She says 'uh oh, brain fart,' and she thinks it's funny. But I prefer to say 'I forgot' because it's not disgusting."
"Me too," I said. "And everyone says it. Even smart people who you wouldn't imagine saying such a crass word."
"Yeah! It's true! Everyone says it! Why do they do that?"
I said that I didn't know and we shook our heads at a world of brain gas that we didn't understand.
Sometimes Claire uses that term and she probably would have defended it if she'd been in the car, but the girls were at a freind's house for a sleep over, so it was just me and the boys.
"We're going to stop at Subway for dinner, guys," I told them. Then I remembered that I didn't know what this kid liked. The nanny had told me that he was allergic to shrimp, which left everything else open. But still, kids can be weird about food. Maybe just the thought of sandwiches made him wet his pants. "Bacchus, you ok with that?"
"Yeah, that's good."
"I just want a six-inch sandwich this time, Mom," said Christopher, who'd been knocking out foot longs lately. "I want to watch my portions."
"Are you on a diet?" Bacchus asked. "They say kids shouldn't diet, it's bad for them."
"No, I'm not on a diet. I just...well...when I get older and I have a girlfriend, when I go to the beach and I take off my shirt I want to show her that I have muscles."
"Dude," Bacchus said, leveling with him. "Girls don't care about a guy's molecular structure."
"Um...do you mean a muscular structure, Bacchus?"
"Oh, yes," he said.
"Because a girl's got to have some standards and most of them like molecules in a man."
"Of course."
During this conversation Christopher had begun convulsing with laughter, and then I felt bad about interrupting. Here were two nine year old boys having a serious conversation about looks, girls, and diets, and I'd interrupted to correct one of them. I should have been filming it.
Bacchus looked over at Christopher who was hanging loosely in his seat belt with his hands over his eyes. "Molecular structure!" he giggled.
"He's not going to stop is he?" assked Bacchus.
"No," I said. "Maybe now's a good time for duct tape."
Bacchus smiled. "Maybe so."

Then the two of them played computer games and talked until they fell asleep. I brought Bacchus home the next day and met with the nanny. He lives with his father, who's a surgeon and who is seldom home. But the nanny I've met a few times and I let her know that I think Bacchus is a great kid, and he's welcome over any time. Even if he didn't use the duct tape.

What's For Dinner?

When I get home from work, dragging my tired, limping body through the door looking bleary eyed and beaten down by the world, the first thing the kids want to know is what's for dinner. I am convinced that this is not because they are hungry. It is because they want to be miserable about it.

"Mom, what's for dinner?" Christopher will ask running up to me.

"Chicken, mashed potatoes, and corn," I'll tell him.

His mouth will drop open. His face is confused and terrified. It's like suddenly he's in a nightmare that he can't wake up from.

"Chicken?!" he'll cry. "I HATE chicken!"
"No you don't," I'll remind him.
"Yes, I do!"
"What's wrong?" Emma will ask rushing to his side.
"We're having gross stuff for dinner!" he'll tell her.
She looks at me. "Again?!"
I'll close my eyes, and take a deep breath. "Yes. Again. I know it's not what you wanted. I'm sorry things had to turn out this way."
"Nooooooooooooo!!!!," she, Christopher and Claire (who has overheard the conversation) will cry and fall to the ground in convulsions, screaming something about how if we were a decent family we would have Subway.


In fact, Claire asked for Subway one night and when I told her that it wasn't in the budget for that week, the look of hope on her face shriveled and she said, "Does that mean we're poor?"

Interesting how fast food not being in the budget is a sign of poverty, isn't it?

So what do I want for dinner, you ask? I want Subway too. And inside I am kicking and screaming because it's not in the budget. I would rather not have a chicken that's been in the crockpot all day. I don't know if anyone else has this problem but I can't seem to cook chicken in the crockpot without it falling to pieces. And it's not a juicy, falling off the bone, tender kind of falling-to-pieces. The chicken just melts. My crockpot is not so much a covenient bit of crockery that cooks for me all day, as much as it is just a disintegrator.

This is what happens: I walk in the door to the good smell of chicken, and the horrified screams of the children who have just noticed that I am not carrying bags of fastfood. I ignore those people and walk into the kitchen. I lift the lid of the crockpot and there is a fully cooked golden chicken bubbling in the broth. Bits of rosemary, onion, and garlic crest the top of it. I poke it with a fork and all of the meat falls off of it at once, sinks to the bottom of the pot, and all that's left on my fork is bone. I don't know how or why this happens but it does. And then there is more screaming, and so I make them go sit at the table and we eat individual bags of chips.

But where's the fiber in that? The Vitamin C? All of those things that parenting magazines beat me over the head with? Where's the flax, damn it?? Well...it's at the bottom of the crockpot along with all of my patience and my sanity. And my budget.

So we gather at the table. We eat the chips, or the pancakes I've made, or the peanut butter crackers with dry ramon noodles on the side. And we talk about our day. And then eventually there's more screaming. But we're full.