Now I know what it really means to be with a 7 year old

It is interesting how life throws challenges at you in the form of these amazingly weird people who are completely bonkers but have no clue about it. Well, those people might think of me as bonkers too, hmm, so in retrospect I would just call them weirdoes because I am not judging anyone here (hope this avoids them judging me as well– Weirdo I can take).

My latest tryst with one such weirdo was with my 7 year old cousin. He is a fun kid most of the times, immensely energetic, persistent, stubborn and full of himself. Whenever he comes back home after giving an examination and someone asks him how it went he would always give a thumbs up sign and say “full marks”. He has this sweet face with an angelic smile and an innocent voice which according to his mother is his saving grace or he would have been beaten up every other day by someone or the other.

One day as his mother scolded him for the umpteenth time, I heard him say “I hate mom”. It shocked me. I tried to reason with him but in vain. Soon I realized that he also hated taking a bath, ugly bugs, Uno (the card game) etc. etc. Sometimes he hated mom in the same sentence as he hated an orange. Makes one think can one really hate his mother? I mean one may hate Hitler or cancer or lizards or pedophiles or may be even the monster under the bed but can one really hate his mother. The word hate is so casually and extensively overused that it doesn’t hold the weight that it should. It is a sad thing that kids today don’t actually understand the strength of the meaning of the word ‘hate’. It is not something to be played with as one does with a cricket bat or Lego.  My warring mind was put to rest when I saw him insisting that he speaks to his mother before sleeping at night. He wouldn’t calm down till he gets to hear her voice on the phone and gets the assurance that she would be back soon. But he hates her the next day.

I call him a ‘Steam Engine’ because of the way he breathes noisily and makes these annoying whispering sounds all the time when he’s told to keep quiet. You can always hear the hiss of the steam making some noise. Steam Engine was caught one day searching the internet for the word b**bs. His mother became frantic and the computer got password protected immediately. In a closely guarded home, where every word being said has to be scrutinized, weighed and then said, the emergence of this word in this kid’s mind was a mystery. It turned out that he heard this word from a cartoon. Unbelievable but true! There are weirdoes making cartoons with such words and even pornography, I am told. And then I get instructions to watch my mouth when I blurt out “shit” casually !

I somehow presumed the duty of narrating a story to Steam Engine before he went to sleep every night. I have no clue how he tricked me into doing so. Once during a story I told him that when kids tell a lie, a muscle moves between their eyebrows and so the adults especially their mothers know when they are lying. He tested it on his elder sister who is fourteen. She went along with the story and told an apparent lie while she moved her forehead. He was thrilled and shouted “hoya, hoya, hoya” (meaning it happened). The phrase was so catchy and hilarious that we started using it as well. So whenever his father came up with some long tale of his we all went “hoya, hoya, hoya” in unison! It was so much fun. Bonkers but fun.

Once the Steam Engine was talking to his grandfather over phone. For some context setting here, a few weeks back, the kid played tennis and he was surprisingly good at it given his age. He got excited and wanted to be coached. His mother got way more excited and found him a coach and bought a racket and shoes for playing tennis. Because apparently you can’t play tennis in your old shoes, you’ve got to have new ones. He wanted to be a professional tennis player and represent Brazil since he is a Brazilian in his head. He went for the classes initially but over a period of time he got bored and a time came when he totally stopped playing tennis. Now, his grandfather was obviously impressed by the fact that his grandson plays tennis and asked him what his favorite game was. He expected the answer to be tennis but to his disappointment the kid replied “chuha-billi (cat chasing the rat) game!

In my mind the kid is completely bonkers or may I say weird if I am not being too harsh about it. But the aged women, experienced by time, who have gained their wisdom by having to handle boys, inform me of the omnipresence of these traits in seven year old boys. It may be an overreaction to call Steam Engine completely bonkers but I am sure that in no way is he normal. So I would still go with weird to say the least.

Now that I’ve let out the pent up steam inside me, I think the kid rightly calls me ‘female Steam Engine’.  😉