Reminders From Fred

Lessons From a Two-Year-Old

Here are five things my two-year-old son has reminded me about life as an adult human.

One.
He splashes in puddles, chases the cat, and squelches his food in his hands. We like it when the world responds. It’s how we know we’re here.

Two.
He gets irate when he’s hungry (as we all do), overwhelmed when he’s tired (as we all do), and just wants to curl up in a blanket when he’s ill (as we all do, Fred – as we all do).

Three.
He can’t be reasoned out of a bad mood. You can’t suggest his emotional response might be disproportionate to the situation at hand (and neither does this work well on adults). He can be distracted from sorrow, or he can endure it – just like the rest of us.

Four.
He gets annoyed when his towers collapse. There’s a gap between what he can do, and what he wishes he could do. That gap is a source of much frustration. That gap never goes away.

Five.
Everything’s just a phase – we say this often of children. It takes on a different meaning as we grow up, as character sets in its mould, but it remains as true as it ever was. Everything’s just a phase.