Happy and Sad

I saw a happy thing today: an ice cream truck.  I love the little kids hemming and hawing over which popsicle to get, I love the tinny music that sounds like a kid's toy running low on batteries, and well, I love ice cream.  But then I saw something very sad: a 4-year-old boy who climbed on the back of the truck and hung on there, refusing to move off of the parked truck.  Ice cream trucks don't have windows, so the driver sat there, oblivious.  My mind fast-forwarded to when the truck would plan to move locations, with the little kid precariously hanging on.  I yelled to the kid to get off the truck until the driver heard me, saw him and shooed him off.  "Where is that kid's parents?" I wondered out loud.

Wherever they were, I can't judge them all too much.  After all, we let our 3-year-old play with a sparkler last night.

Please put down the phone and reconsider your call to Child Protection- here, let me distract you with some pretty pictures:

In this heat, most people had to decide if they were going to go see fireworks or if they were going to stay home.  We're lucky enough to never have to make the decision; our hilltop-perched house is less than a mile from where our city puts on their show.  We can literally sit on the living room couch and watch the fireworks display themselves right in our window.  It's totally worth all of the years where no one felt like putting on bug spray and battling parking to keep me company for the big Ooh-ah.  Oliver had a fantastic time, but an 11pm bedtime for a 3 year old equaled some emotional meltdowns today.  The fact that he was not allowed to throw a glass coaster, the fact that he jumped on my head a little too hard, and the fact that his pickles were sliced and not baby dills caused his lower lip to quiver and tears fall into sad little puddles at his feet. 

"Wow, you are so tired Oliver," I observed.

"No," he sobbed, "no not tyyyyyyyyyy-errrrrrrrrddd!!"

"Are you sad?" I offered.

"No not saaaaaaaadddddd! Not saaaaaddd!"

"Are you happy?"

"I happy AND sa-ha-ha-haaaaaddddd!"

An hour later, we had our emotional little man tucked into bed.  Against all fatigue and excuses, I reluctantly dragged myself to Lifetime, with my one consolation being that a swimming workout would feel awesome outside today.  As I walked onto the pool deck, I noticed that there weren't a lot of people there, which made me happy; but then I saw something sad.  Lifeguards dragging those ominous pool nets, fishing for kiddie poop.  Sigh...yet another parent who thinks their kid doesn't poop so the rule about wearing swim diapers doesn't apply to them.  Their kids probably hang off of ice cream trucks.