Cute at three = creepy at thirty.

My son is a little in love with me these days, and I can’t say I mind. Who would mind when one of the great loves of her life, the human being for whom she has sacrificed many hours of sleep and an inexpressible degree of personal freedom, declares that she’s as beautiful as a princess? That she has the softest cheeks on the planet? That she smells better than his teddy bear? (God, I should hope so. He sleeps on that thing. And drools on it. It smells like feet.) He’s taken to remarking on my clothing, and whether or not he approves of it. And when I meet his approval, I admit it, I get a little thrill. On more than one snowy winter morning I have caught myself putting on mascara when there was no chance of us ever leaving the house or seeing another human being. Dear Lord, I thought, I’m doing this to impress a three-year-old.

He has developed a ritual we engage in when I pick him up from school: he runs into my arms, I gather him up, and he rubs his cheek against mine. At first we managed to separate ourselves and head for the door after a few passes of cheek against cheek, but every time, the ritual has grown lengthier and more intricate. Now it’s a full two or three minutes of cheek rubbing, stroking my cheeks with his (inevitably sticky) hands, and gently kissing my cheeks all while murmuring, “Mama, mama.” It’s very sweet, but meanwhile we’re in an enclosed area surrounded by other parents and their offspring, none of whom seem as compelled to engage in a quasi-makeout session with their parents, all of whom are knocking into us, trying to get at their coats and lunchboxes and get out. I move as much to one side as I can, but his little hands are all over my face, blocking my peripheral vision. “Don’t you want to go to the playground?” I ask. “Don’t you want to tell me about your day?” “Shhh,” he whispers. “Shhhh.”

Outside, he is my protector. If someone almost runs us over (which seems to happen with alarming frequency) and I gasp or shout or deliver some (I hope) cutting remark, he’s all over the situation, ready to kick some ass if I give the say-so. Usually he’s a few seconds too late, but still, I appreciate the gesture “What did they do? Where are they?” he says, wheeling around, as the car in question disappears over the horizon.

The other day at the playground, an older boy growled violently in Henry’s face just as he approached, and while I don’t normally intervene in such matters, I thought that was out of line. And, well, I told him so. I tried to be gentle, but I’ve found that little boys either disregard you entirely or suffer deep emotional wounding, and this kid took the latter tack. He took off into the protective arms of his babysitter, who rolled her eyes at me. Meanwhile, Henry was outraged. “What did he say to you?” he demanded of me. “What did that little boy do to you?” He stalked toward him, all but rolling up his sleeves. “Why did you make my mother say that to you?” he screamed at the kid. Eventually we cleared things up and they were soon playing Power Rangers on the Death Star.

Another day, Henry was playing “Shark!” with two of his classmates, boys who are as verbal as Henry and thus equally amenable to spinning elaborate scenarios instead of, say, running at top speed into walls. In this episode of “Shark!” there was a shark (duh) on the prowl in the waters, the waters being whatever was not the jungle gym. Henry and his friends screamed the location, status, and harpoon-ability of the shark at each other from opposite ends of the jungle gym. Then at one point one of the boys looked down and realized I was in the water! Right next to the shark! “Aiiiiiigh! Shark! Shark!” he screamed at me, and I gamely threw myself to the ground, shrieking that the shark had my leg and wasn’t letting go. Henry was obliviously screaming about the shark being near the swings and maybe they should head over to the swings and check things out, but snapped to attention when the boy ran to him and shrieked, “Henry! The Shark! Has! Your! MOTHER!”

At that, Henry did not hesitate to leap off the jungle gym (or, to be more accurate, step slowly and deliberately down the ladder—but with great purpose), despite the boys’ protests that we would surely both be killed. He ran toward me and pulled me to safety. “Climb on my back!” he shouted, “It’s the only way!”

I was describing Henry’s exploits to my husband the other night, and I sighed and said, “You know, someday he’s not going to be this in love with me.” And my husband looked at me and said, “Um, don’t you want it that way?”

Which, really, is an excellent point. I guess.

There's no real point to this.

Tuesday after school, Henry and I headed to a nearby playground. When we got there he went straight for a seal statue that sits right in the center of the playground. It’s supposed to spout water in the summer, although I’ve never seen it work.

He sat down on it. “This is my favorite seal,” he said. “This is my best friend. My best seal friend.”

“Really,” I said, “You’ve never mentioned him.”

“He is my best friend, and his name,” Henry declared, “is Frompy.”

“Frumpy?”

“Frompy. I love him so, so much. I lie down on him, and I look up at the sky, and I dream. I dream of Frompy. At night I come here all by myself and I play with him.”

“Does he come to life?”

“No, he does not come to life.” He glared at me. I would never understand! About Frompy!

“I have to say, I’ve never seen you even look at him before.”

“And when I have to leave him I am so, so sad, I miss him so much because Frompy is my best friend ever in my whole world.” He started to tear up.

Then Henry leapt off the statue and announced that it was time to see “the crazy dancers.” The “crazy dancers” he refers to are African natives performing ceremonial dances; they can be seen on video at the Brooklyn Museum, which is mere steps away from the playground we were in. I happen to have a museum pass and I wanted to nip in the bud any Frompy-related hysteria, so I said sure! Museum it is!

Oh, dear god, was he happy. Time to see the crazy dancers! He loves the crazy dancers. He asks to see them all the time, and every time he does this spazzy little jig.

So we headed for the museum, and when we got there I let Henry hit the button to open the handicapped/stroller entrance door. Only nothing happened, because the museum was closed.

Joy turned to outrage and tears. “I am so disappointed,” he wept, “Why won’t you let me see the crazy dancers?” I tried to explain that I couldn’t make them open the museum, but he wasn’t buying it. We sat on a bench near the entrance and I held him while he railed against me and the museum and all the forces that were keeping him from crazy-dance appreciation.

Inevitably, a man with some sort of disability approached us. He was mewling in a disconcerting way, but then I looked at him and he had the sweetest expression, and he only wanted to help and I was a jerk for thinking I should get Henry out of there before he came any closer. He reached into his bag, pulled out a pack of Wrigley’s, and waved it toward Henry. “That’s okay,” I said.

He shook his head and started digging around in his bag. He pulled out a mangled candy bar. “Really, we’re fine,” I said, holding up my hand as he tried to give it to Henry.

Then he handed me a can of Chef Boyardee. Henry took notice. “What is he giving us?” he asked. “Spaghetti in a can,” I said, as I tried to shake my head in as friendly a way as I could manage. He rummaged and rummaged some more, and then he took out a biscuit. A completely intact biscuit had somehow managed to survive the contents of his bag. I said goodbye and Henry said “No, THANK YOU” to the biscuit and we walked away, but I kind of wanted to see what would come next. A layer cake? A roast chicken?

On our way home Henry kept trying to tell me something complicated about treasure maps, but I was pushing him in his stroller and all I could hear was his shouting “YOU’RE NOT LISTENING.” I stopped and leaned over to tell him I couldn’t hear him, and a man came out of nowhere, grinning at us. “What are you doing!” he said. “Are you having a problem!”

“We’re talking,” I said.

“Talking is good! I want to talk to you about Jesus today!” and then he handed me a pamphlet. I saw the words “End of Days” and I grabbed it because I love me the crazy pamphlets. “Thanks!” I said, and walked away. He was still talking.

“There are crazy people out today, Henry,” I said, and he said, “But are they dancers?”

Burning onions = ten years of therapy.

While Henry organized his Stormtroopers, I had some precious phone time with my friend.

“Damn, I burned my onions,” said Stacey.

“You burned your onions?” I said. “I didn’t even know you were cooking. You cook while you’re talking? You talk while you’re cooking?”

“I’m a multitasker,” she said.

Henry, meanwhile, was staring at me. “Who burned what?” he asked.

“Stacey burned her onions,” I told him.

“Let me talk to her,” he said. He grabbed the phone and confirmed the events surrounding the onions, and the burning of said onions.

Eventually I got the phone back. While I attempted to finish our conversation, Henry pulled at my leg, barraging me with questions regarding The Burning.

I began to lose my patience. I suggested that he play. Look at a book. Do something while I have the only interaction I’ve had with an adult all day except for those few minutes with the cashier at the supermarket that I continued way past an appropriate point.

His lower lip began to quiver. “But why did everything get all burned up?” he said. Then I noticed he was holding his special bear.

Finally I got it. Burning. Fire. Three-year-old listening, thinking our friend is aflame.

I explained to him as best I could about what we meant when we said the food “burned,” how it’s not on fire and etc. He was not appeased. I got off the phone and sat next to him. He leapt onto my lap and dug his head into my chest.

I explained it all again. “That was confusing, when we talked about something burning, wasn’t it? You were worried.” He nodded vigorously into my boobs.

“I didn’t understand,” he said.

“Well, why would you? When we say something’s burning, we usually mean it’s on fire, right?”

“I’m sorry I didn’t understand about the burning,” he said.

“You don’t have to be sorry about that,” I said, and held him tighter.

When I was three, a boy we called Little David began spending weekends with us. I am unclear about the reasoning behind this, but I know that he lived at an orphanage where my mother was a volunteer. It seems strange to me that the orphanage would loan children to volunteers, but there it is. Little David came for weekends, and according to my parents, I did not like this at all. He was maybe a year younger than me, and very physical and boisterous, and I was a little girl who liked everything just so and he was touching my stuff and he even slept in my room, and I wanted him out out out. So after a few weekends, my mom told the orphanage the weekend arrangement wasn’t working.

The following weekend I asked my mother where Little David was. “Don’t worry,” she said, “We know you didn’t like having him here, so Little David’s not coming back.”

The next morning I woke up and couldn’t talk.

I couldn’t talk for a while, actually. Well, can you imagine? I had wielded untold power! One complaint from me and I could disappear people! How could I say something? What would happen next? I would say I didn’t like my hamburger and then all the cows on Earth would spontaneously combust?

Eventually everyone in charge figured out what had happened; I was reassured and shortly thereafter I returned to my usual chatty self. And every time I heard the story of my temporary muteness, I would wonder at how impressionable little kids are. I knew, however, that when I was a parent I would certainly be as mindful as I could of my child’s fragile grasp on how the world works.

But the thing is, it’s haaaard. It’s like you’re raising an intelligent, perceptive, mildly psychotic Armenian. He’s got a good grasp of the language, the Armenian, but he doesn’t get the idiomatic expressions, he has frighteningly good hearing, he remembers everything, and he’s extremely sensitive. You can’t get away with anything with this Armenian. Don’t tell your husband, after a long day, that you’re pooped—because five days later the Armenian will shout to you in the supermarket “WHY WERE YOU POOPED DID YOU HAVE POOP ON YOU?” (For instance.)

A few months before the Armenian really wasn’t as interested in what you had to say. He didn’t have a real handle on the language, so if conversation went over his head he would let it pass him by. He was invincible, the Armenian—if he didn’t get something, it didn’t need to be gotten. All that mattered was what he knew. But now he’s figuring out how much he doesn’t know, and how much he needs to know, and suddenly he spends a lot more time with his bear, on your lap, needing some extra comfort.

Okay, so my metaphor has fallen apart, but you get what I’m saying.

A couple of hours later we were playing on the floor, and he asked me what the floor was made of. Was it made of sticks, like in the Three Little Pigs? He studied the floor, checking it for signs of weakness. “No, no, it’s nice, sturdy wood,” I said, and he knocked on it. There was a faint echo.

“Hey, it’s like someone knocked back from underneath there,” I said. As I said it I thought, hmm, perhaps this isn’t the image you want to give your child, and before I could even finish the thought he was back on my lap with his bear.

Hey, at least he can still talk.

Speaking of bananas...

My son eats three foods. And this is making me insane.

Okay, maybe a little more than three. Here’s the list. Anyone who’s not a parent is signing off right abouuut… now, so without shame I can show the rest of you…

Everything My Son Will Ingest:

Milk and soy milk

Cereal

Oatmeal

Muffins

Yogurt

Blueberries

American cheese

Macaroni and cheese

Ricotta cheese with pasta (but only certain shapes, and those rules change all the time)

Ravioli (sometimes, and you will never know when

Applesauce

Raisins

Hummus (when he’s feeling generous)

All forms of pudding

Ice cream (duh), cookies (dar)

And that’s it! And don’t think I’m forgetting something. “Surely pizza!” you might say, but no, not pizza. “What about bagels? Every kid loves bagels!” Not my kid. Shut up.

I know this is a control thing. I know if I make a big deal, or any kind of deal, over this, it’s only going to get worse. I know many kids go through this. I know he’ll grow out of it, someday, maybe. But right now it makes me nuts at just about every meal. Okay, not breakfast. Breakfast is okay. And for lunch, I’ve just given up—I hand him his two containers of yogurt and I lie down on the ground until he calls for me. So really it’s just dinner.

Last year at Thanksgiving I broke down in tears because he wouldn’t consider a single food. Not a cranberry, not a single chunk of yam. Turkey? HAHAHAHAHA. At some point during his second year he fixated on macaroni and cheese as the Ideal Dinner, and this festive evening was no different. So my sister said, “Just give him macaroni and cheese every night. He’ll get sick of it.”

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHHHhhahhhhhah. Heh. Hmm.

So here we are, over one year later. Every night, either Annie or Amy provides him with his dinner. (I have tried making it myself, but homemade macaroni and cheese was deemed the worst crime any mother could commit.) For a while he would enjoy peas or green beans with it, but no more will he even tolerate the sight of the green horrors. Such an atrocity cannot even remain on his plate.

And fruit! Oh, how he used to love fruit! Clementines and mango and bananas and apples and everything else! Kid liked fruit!

Even a few weeks ago, he would request apples and bananas. Request them! No more. These days, fruit is of the devil. Fruit will not be tolerated. Don’t even think about it, with the fruit. Except blueberries, which are currently $45 a pint. I’m not buying them. Or applesauce, and is that even really a fruit? When a fruit has been sauced, may we still call it fruit?

His pediatrician recommended that we cease commenting on his eating, but that we also make sure that we’re eating well in his presence. Somehow being around a variety of foods, even if he’s not ingesting them, will have an effect. But I do! I do that! She also stressed the importance of the family dinner, and we can’t seem to manage that because my husband for some reason can’t come home at a reasonable hour even when he leaves home early and that’s an entirely different topic that’s making me want to cry every day, but as for me, I eat so well! (At least as far as he knows).

He’ll watch me eating, he’ll cook with me, he’ll smell the food we’re cooking or I’m eating and he’ll exclaim over the wonderfulness of the smells, and like a fool I begin to hope. I let myself believe that maybe he’s interested, that maybe he wants to (I can barely write it) taste something.

And then my mouth starts to open and my brain is screaming SHUT UP SHUT UP DON’T EVEN SAY IT, but I do! Because I’m not smart! I say, “You want a taste?” and then it’s all over. I might as well have suggested that I whip out the kitchen shears and snip off his tongue. He clamps his mouth shut and presses both fists over his mouth and emits the worst sound ever made, a sound I can’t even describe except it makes me want to scoop out my eardrums with a grapefruit spoon rather than hear it for one moment longer.

Everything I read, everything I hear, is telling me to LEAVE HIM ALONE, but I have such a hard time LEAVING HIM ALONE. I don’t even worry that much about the nutritional challenges of his limited diet; we indulge often in smoothies that I pack with all manner of supplementary materials, and/or muffins that are crammed with vegetables and exotic grains. I know he’s getting what he needs. What kills me is that we can’t just eat the same damn dinner. That I can’t share with him food that I know he would like if he would even have a tiny bite. That going to a restaurant is a near impossibility. He won’t even eat the foods that are bad for him, that’s he’s supposed to like! Like French fries! Or grilled cheese! Or those nuggets composed of mashed chicken parts! Or ketchup THE KID WON’T EAT KETCHUP WHAT IS WRONG WITH HIM.

Tonight I failed, once again, to leave him alone. I dusted apple slices in cinnamon and sugar and ate them in front of him. He ignored me. I waved the sugary slices in front of his face and made yummy noises, but he continued to pointedly ignore me. Finally I said, “Apples with cinnamon! Mmm! Want a piece! Sure you do!” and he did the clamping-fists-indescribable sound. THEN he demanded “just plain cinnamon.” I refused him this. He immediately dissolved in tears. “Just plain cinnamon! Just plain cinnamon!” he repeated, approximately 57 times. Then I lost it. I explained, at a somewhat (aherm) elevated volume, that I was not going to simply hand him the cinnamon shaker, that if he was going to have a snack, which was by no means required, it was going to have some sort of nutritional aspect to it. Then he cried like I told him his teddy bear was going to Hell. Then he screamed repeatedly, anguished yawps of cinnamon deprivation. And I yelled, because I was trying to provide him with a model of how not to behave. He didn’t seem to get the message, because he yelled back.

Then! Because my mind was still not working right! I launched into a long and convoluted explanation of why he needs to eat nutritious foods, how such foods will make him big and strong. This didn’t work because he informed me that he doesn’t want to ever get big and/or strong. Then the rest of my brain died and I came up with the brilliant idea of a chart! We would make a chart, and every time Henry ate a new food we would put a star on the chart, and when the chart was full Henry would get a toy!

He liked this idea—focusing, as he was, on the word “toy.” We went to the refrigerator. “I’ll have a yogurt,” he said, “then we’ll get a toy.” I explained to him what “new” meant. There were more tears. I tried to take back the chart idea, but he couldn’t let it go. “We’ll have some milk,” he said, “And then, toy.” Once again I explained, no, ha ha, he already drinks milk. How about some black bean soup?

More tears. More attempting to take back the not-very-smart chart idea I had. I tried to get across to him that the chart would not result in instant gratification, that he would need to try 1,2,3,4,5! new foods. Then I said we should forget it and play and LOOK OVER THERE! IS THAT A SUPERHERO IN OUR CURTAINS?

He continued staring into the refrigerator. Finally he said, “I want to try black bean soup. I think it’s going to be,” he squinted, “a little good.”

I attempted to remain calm. I heated a few teaspoons of soup in the smallest bowl we own, and placed it before him. He took a tinier sip than I thought a human being could take, smiled, and said, “Okay, where’s my toy?”

P.S. Apparently this is International De-Lurking Week, and although I am not fond of the term "De-Lurking"--implying, as it does, that you are obligated to comment and if you don't you are creepy--I still like the idea of the Week and it's nice to hear from all of you. So! Say hello, why don't you?