Of Hissy-Fits and Hamster Wisdom

It’s one of those cold, grey, rainy days in November that really lets you know Winter is on the way... just cold enough to make being wet miserable as you stand waiting with your children for a school bus that has yet to meet a regular pickup time. I walked home trying not to step in any puddles since my boots seem to have sprung some new leaks, knowing that it was going to feel wonderful to wrap my hands around a mug of warm tea as I blogged this.

It has been raining and cold since Halloween night, so perhaps it is getting to the girls, but they were just horrid to each other yesterday. I had the van in order to take Erin to the doctor’s for a follow-up to make sure that her tonsils were going back down after the last infection and tried to do most of my messages before I picked them up from school. During the one stop I couldn’t put off and was looking forward to the most, they got into a huge fight in the store and Bethany ended up having one of those total meltdown hissy fits that I haven’t seen in ages. Absolutely mortified but sticking to my guns of “This is not how we behave in a store we are leaving NOW!” I handed the book making papers I’d wanted to play with back to the sales clerk and told him that I would be back to shop sometime without my children before marching them both to the van. Before we had children, I can remember seeing other kids have hissy-fits in stores and thinking to myself, rather smugly, MY children will never do that!! I am sure seeing my two at their finest yesterday was a wonderful form of birth control for any single people in the shop. The amazing thing is how quickly tantrums like that blow over in children. Perhaps they haven’t yet mastered the adult art of holding a grudge. Within half an hour of getting home, Bethany wandered down from her room with a hand drawn “Sorry” card to Erin and I. Erin was more reluctant about saying sorry back to her sister, so perhaps she is already learning what we adults should not be proud of knowing... how to keep anger inside and let it smolder. At least by this morning, all seemed to have been forgotten and forgiven.

Coming down into the basement with my mug of tea, I peeked in on Nipper, our dwarf hamster, who was curled up snugly in her nest of shredded kleenex and toilet paper. We just learned a few days ago that the fluffy bedding we’d been buying at the pet shop was probably not the best thing for her to sleep in since arranging it can sometimes harm their little cheek pouches. Kleenex and toilet paper will be much cheaper anyway and she certainly has had fun shredding it even smaller than we provided it to make herself cozy.

I watched her twitch in her sleep and felt a bit envious at her wisdom. Nipper obviously knew that this was the time of wet, cold day where one should just snuggle up somewhere cozy and do very little. We’ve just put the fuzzy “Brunswick” sheets on our bed (sometimes called health sheets and oh so wonderfully cozy) and the urge to crawl back under them was pretty tempting... until I thought about the heart attack that might give our cleaning ladies this morning. I don’t wake up from naps very well and nothing is scarier than a grumpy dragon with bed head! I shall have to pass on that Hamster wisdom for now and get my work done...