Nate and I got into it last night.

That will wear you out when that happens at the end of the day….but I guess it makes sense that it would happen at the end of the day….when we were both already worn out.

It was something about not wanting to use the minty fluoride rinse….and then it turned into a contest of wills.

That’s hard.

I just really did not want to use the fluoride rinse….no matter how emphatic Nate was that I needed to use it.

No….I’m kidding.

It was Nate who didn’t want to use it.

You can guess the outcome of the story.

It was me sitting on the lid of the toilet, Nate standing on his stool at the sink….crying and yelling that he wasn’t going to use the stupid mouthwash….me telling him that he was…

We were in there for a while….a really long while….and then he finally relented and used the mouthwash and we found Teddy and went to go to sleep.

I told him that he was acting like a baby and he yelled, “I’M NOT A BABY!!”

I said, “No….I didn’t say that you were a baby….I said that you were acting like a baby.”

“YOU’RE A BABY!!! YOU’RE A BABY!!! YOU’RE A BABY!!”

He was pretty mad at me.

And the outcome of that exchange was that I said our prayers really quickly and did our blessings really perfunctorily ….and said goodnight…and turned my back to him.

No cuddling last night….no talking about what other things were on his mind.

All because of a stupid mouthwash that was supposed to help his teeth not rot out of his head before the grownup teeth grow in.

That pretty much sucks.

That’s a crummy way for both of us to end the evening.

And then, to top everything off, I get up this morning and read that Italian doctors are planning a human head transplant in 2017….and, weirdly enough, expect a 90% chance of success.

I don’t think that it’s just a cosmetic procedure, though.

That would be kind of extreme.

That would be extreme even for one of the members of the Kardashian family to do.

But back to Nate.

I hate those “excited” exchanges….but if you don’t press for some beneficial resolution to the conflict, it just escalates and keeps happening over and over.

I think that’s right, at least.

Maybe Nate’s right?

Maybe I am a BABY?!!

A baby walking around in a big man’s suit?

The adult observation would be phrased something like, “No….sometimes you act immaturely….”

I’ve heard that one before…..but maybe I AM just a baby.

Who knows?

I’m not going to let some newly turned six-year-old affect my sense of self with an angry comment like, “YOU’RE A BABY!!! YOU’RE THE BABY!!! YOU’RE A BABY!!”

I’m not a baby….I’M A MAN.

This human head thing is kind of freaking me out, too.

Who wants to live in a world where they can swap all of our parts out like that?

My head goes with me.

Let me keep my own baby head, thankyou please.

 

“mannish boy” Muddy Waters