Silence is golden

When Adrian was a baby growing into toddlerhood, I remember a few noisy playdates with older children, and those moms who would joke about how you had to watch out when you couldn't hear the kids. That when everything goes quiet was when you knew you were in trouble.

At that point, I really wasn't apart from Adrian unless he was sleeping or in someone else's care -- you just don't leave an 18-month-old alone very often. So I would laugh along with them, nod my head in agreement, make those sounds of polite assent that we make. "Mmm-hmm, I know what you mean. You say it, sister," and so on.

Well, my house went very quiet this morning, and I understand even better what those moms meant. There are different qualities of quiet.

There's the quiet of your child quietly coloring at the table, and there's the quiet as your child silently covers every white-painted surface in the kitchen with pink highlighter. (Adrian, age 2.)

There's the quiet of your child building a block tower next to your desk, and there's the quiet of him plucking every letter key off your iBook keyboard while you're getting his lunch ready. (Adrian, age 3.)

And there's the quiet of your child playing Legos or patting the cat. Then there's the quiet of your child silently unwrapping four spools of thread around the living room furniture. (Nathan, this morning, age 4.)

When I caught Nathan this morning, he was on his tenth circuit of the living room, with about 250 yards of thread strung out behind him. He looked so pleased with himself, and had concentrated to thoroughly on the job, that I just said, "OHhhhh well, what do we have here?" (Note that I flowed seamlessly from "OH MY GOD" to Oh well..." -- that takes practice.) He said he was making a web so the flies would get caught. Who can blame him? They're pesky this year. And even when he asked if he could have scissors, I let him do it -- what's my frustration about having thread ends all over the house, compared to his satisfaction with a job well done?

So he cut the thread into about a thousand pieces, and we picked all of them up together so the cats wouldn't eat any of the strings.

And now it's very quiet in here but it's the kind of quiet that means both children are at school, the cats are outside, the dryer has stopped cycling, and it's time to get on with the housework.