Asher's friend Raina was in town and we decided to go to the beach with her. Raina moved (with her parents of course) to Thailand two years ago, but Asher and Raina remain good friends even though they only see each other once a year.I stocked the car with toys for the drive. One toy was a "ViewMaster." You put in circular slides and look through a binocular like device to see the pictures. We only have pictures of "The Little Mermaid" but Asher doesn't know that movie. Raina took a turn.
"It is Ariel" Raina reported.
"No it is Dora!" Asher answered a little too loudly.
"Ariel!" Now Raina was screaming even louder than Asher.
"Dora!" screamed Asher (of course it is Raina that is correct)
"It is Ariel!" Raina was really getting mad. And loud.
Now I will skip many more of these exchanges and let the reader use their imagination. Wait, I will help. Imagine more screaming. Louder and louder, but the same things being said over and over.
Finally, Asher screamed, "There are no more Ariels! Ariels are extinct!"
Luckily, Raina's mom, Renee has a sense of humor and saw how funny Asher's comment was.
Two moms, two three year olds and 100 miles to the beach. It sounded like a good idea. But this first screaming match happened while we were still within the Portland City limits. Part of the problem is that Asher's car seat is somewhat permanently installed in the middle of the back of the car, so we had to install the second car seat for Raina RIGHT NEXT TO HIM. So they could touch. And poke. And hit. And even spit.
But I didn't expect any of that to happen. Really, they are such good friends outside of the car. But each day I drive around with just Asher in the back seat. I just never knew what it would be like to put another 3 year old right next to him. The kind of fighting they were doing was something I would expect from much older children.
We drove for another 45 minutes singing songs, and telling stories and trying to keep Asher and Raina occupied. Somewhere on one of the mountain passes Asher announced that he had to pee. There was not a safe place to pull over for a few miles. Asher chanted, "I have to pee, I have to pee I have to pee!" until I saw a place to pull over. Raina decided to pee also. When they were done, Asher climbed into the back of the wagon. The "way back" we used to call it when I was a child. He began to rumage through the bags I had packed. And he found the JUICE BOXES. In a hurry to pack, I packed two three packs of Knudsen Organic juice boxes. If I had more time I would have opened the packages and just put a couple in the cooler. But, I put the three packs in the car expecting to open them out of sight of the children once we got to the beach.
"Juice Boxes!" Asher said in his I found something I shouldn't have tone of voice.
Asher has a radar for such things and always finds them. His bionic eye will scan my purse from three feet away. "Mom, is that licorice at the bottom of your bag?"
But back to the juice boxes.
"I will just hold them until we get to the beach," he assured me. We have strict rules: no juice until you eat your lunch.
Asher chose to hold the grape and the other was tropical punch. We still had about 45 minutes to drive and Raina wanted to hold juice boxes also. So I grabbed the other three pack.
"I don't like pineapple!" complained Raina when she saw the picture on tropical punch boxes.
"Asher, will you trade with Raina please?" I asked in my most neutral mom voice.
"No!!!!!!!" screamed Asher. No one was reasonable at this point.
When we got to the beach things got better. They ran, they threw sand. They played a game where you scoop up sand in a shovel and throw it in the ocean while screaming, "Goodbye pee and poop!" They were so thrilled with this game they ran over to tell Renee and me about it.
"First you scoop the sand with the shovel and then you say 'goodbye pee and poop!'" Then they giggled.
We pretended to also think that was very funny.
Then Asher and Raina chased a seagull a half mile down the beach. They ran so far we thought they would surely sleep on the way home.
But on the way home there was just more fighting:
Asher "I love you."
Raina " I don't love you. I only love my mommy and my daddy."
Asher "No, you do love me. And you also love my mommy and my daddy."
Raina "No! I don't love you!"
Multiply this conversation times a million. Thats how long it seemed to go on.
I don't remember the specifics of their conversations, but I do remember that we got stuck in traffic on the way in to Portland. It was about 5pm on a Friday and we were sitting in the car in traffic that did not move. At all. Renee twisted her body around and put an arm between Asher and Raina to keep them from hitting each other.
I think Renee said something to Raina like, "Do you remember when we talking about provoking people?"
I desperately tried to convince Asher to stop hitting and spitting while the car inched its way along Highway 26 toward Portland.
What would the parenting books say to do? Renee and I wondered. Then it dawned on us. Common sense and the books would say to separate them. But we were in the middle lane of a three lane highway with no shoulder. Even the preschool teachers couldn't have fixed this one.
Now Renee, her husband Rick and Raina are back in Thailand. It has been a month since our beach trip and it just seems funny now. I even wish Raina's family was here today so we could drive to the beach again. But maybe this time we would rent a mini-van.
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