Havering

Having young kids means havering an awful lot. Innocent stuff, mostly. A few years ago, when Non was very young, I happened to tell her that tiny dogs were running on batteries. I can't remember what exactly prompted it. I think we saw one of those ridiculously minuscule dogs being walked in the street, and she must have asked if it was a toy or real ... Don't ask me why, I just came up with this battery rubbish, and she just loved it. For the next year or so, every time we saw a small dog, she would ask: "Does this one take one or two batteries?"or "What size batteries does this one need?"

Anyway, with Zsebi having just turned four, once again I find myself talking rubbish on a daily basis. Not to confuse him at all. It's just sometimes I find myself in a kind of situation with him where the easiest way to calm him is, well, by inventing something.

Let me give you an example: one night last week, at bedtime, he said he was scared. Why? "Because there's a family of foxes living under my bed," came the answer. We investigated. Grabbed some torches, moved some furniture. No foxes. "But they come out when we switch off the light," Zsebi insisted.

So I told him a bedtime story, making it up as we went along, about a general medical condition prevalent in Britain's fox population. They are scared of heights, and they can't walk upstairs. If they attempt to get to the bedroom, they will get sick. On the stairs. See their tails are so bushy they find it difficult to balance...And start throwing up immediately.

By the time I got to these horrid details, he was fast asleep. Good for him. And he's never since mentioned foxes under the bed.

And yesterday brought another fine example of my havering: Zsebi refused to wear his new pair of navy trousers because he discovered that there was a small bat motif on one leg. "It bites me," he said, on the verge on a tantrum. Just as we really, really had to leave the house not to be late for an important randez-vous. "Look, let me show you something," I said in desperation. "This is the bat release button; if you push it, the bat will fly off." "And will it attack meanies?," he asked. Tantrum averted. Long conversation about meanies followed. A few minutes later, he was proudly showing off the bat release button to fellow passangers on the tram. And the bat one is now his favourite pair of trousers. It's official.