Day 150 through 153

Three Little Words . . . I HATE YOU.

Strange things, words are.  They are more dangerous than any weapon known to man.  They don’t have the capacity to take a life, but can make a man wish he was dead.  At the same time, they can just as easily heal all wounds.  Sometimes it is the simplest of phrase that cuts the deepest or a two word kindness that warms the soul.  Every language is full of them you see.  Subtle, yet powerful, phrases that carry with them the weight of the world.  We are all well familiar with the sweetest of them.  The “I love you” has been fodder for Valentine greeting cards since time began, but there are many two or three word exchanges that carry with them an equal impact.  “I am sorry”, “I miss you”, “I believe you”, “I believe in you” and a simple “Good Job”, are just a few of the positive phrases that can make all the difference in the world.  As with all things in life, there can be no appreciation of the light without first understanding the dark.  So too is true when talking about the use of the common phrase.  My youngest has most recently taken to using what is in my opinion, the darkest of the dark.  “I hate you” resonates with a startling clang when uttered from the mouth of a child.  Children are basic beings and it is only the simplest of phrases that are easily mastered.  Unfortunately, it is these simple phrases that often carry with them the most weight.  Most usually, his elder brother is his target, but he seems willing to cast this evil spell any time things don’t go his way.  Hatred is an evil thing to carry in one’s heart.  It consumes the soul faster than a wildfire consumes a once vibrant forest.  It burns out of control without any discretion as to its next victim.  I cares not whom it devours and if left unchecked will leave only the charred remains of one’s character left in it’s smoldering wake.

I have taken great care in discussing this fact with my youngest in the only manner a small child can understand.  The use of stories and imagery help the lesson sink in and knowing in its simplest terms the difference between good and bad, helps to deliver the final blow.  Hatred is BAD and as in most childhood tales, the “Good” always wins out over the “Bad”.  So far he seems satisfied with this explanation and the desire to be one of the “Good” guys has quelled his desire to court the wrong side in the battle of “Good” vs. “Evil”.  In a lot of ways, the move we have made has been a fair bit easier and a yet harder still for the youngest of our clan.  He has adapted well to the “French” way of life and his natural proclivity toward the language make everyday life a breeze, however, being a three year old and all that entails is difficult enough when one must conquer these growing pains in the shadow of their own cultural awareness, being a stranger in a strange land makes one a bit less comfortable with change.  Despite his need to stabilize a bit, he seems to be as happy with his new life as any of us, however, he still asks about “Mommy’s white house” referring to our farm back in Eastern Kansas.  You can take the boy out of the country (literally), but you can’t take the country out of the boy.  Pretty profound commentary, I think.

Given our continued difficulty with internet access, I am only allowed an infrequent access to the information super highway by way of the Chateau’s WiFi connection.  Better than McDonalds, but I don’t want to eat up their bandwidth by surfing about, so I will occasionally steal some access and upload a post or two when time permits.  Today, the 20^th of July marks my eldest 9^th birthday.  We have family in town . . . I think (difficult air travel), so we celebrated here at the house a day or so early.  There were two notable events to report.  The first was my “French” chocolate birthday cake that went over about like a turd sandwich.  The cake was fairly decent, but the “French” cream icing recipe my wife provided me from the Internets left something to be desired.  Its taste was familiar, but the consistency was a bit on the booger side.  The youngest ate nothing but the icing.  This was notable and due to his recent proclivity for picking his nose and going for the mouth with his bounty, not all that surprising.  The second birthday surprise worth a mention was that good ole mom and dad sprung for a spanking new I-Pad as a fairly extravagant gift.  The techno wizardry that the kind folks at Apple are capable of is nothing short of astounding.  While nothing really more than a toy from a computing standpoint, it is a neat and fairly portable gizmo for those that are e-mail minded and don’t want to get carpel tunnel from attempting to write an email on a smartphone.  I don’t know how kids these days utilize these things.  I use mine a fair bit for email given our internet problems and I can scarcely produce a coherent thought without the aid of the auto correct feature that is only correct half of the time.  For those that have received such emails, I apologize.  Once again blame Bill Gates and his freaking Windows phone.

Two days have past since the arrival of my eldest new toy and I now realize that high line electronics and stone floors do not make good bed fellows.  The equipment still functions, but after an accidental fall to the floor, the face of the item now has an ouchie that is going to require a trip to the Apple Store in town to get fixed.  That should be a complete disaster linguistically, but the old cave man method of pointing at the crack and grunting with disapproval should get my point across.  What I don’t understand is why they can’t come up with a space age polymer with a little more resilience.  This thing didn’t take much of a tumble and cracked like a freaking egg.  It really is a good thing it is in the hands of my 9 year old, for it made two whole days before major incident.  If it was in my wife or I’s hands, it would have met and untimely death on day one.  Small and slick, it is difficult to keep clumsy hands on.  When they make them more bomb proof, I might endeavor to procure one for myself.  Actually that is not true since I don’t really have a need for the added bulk and my Gen 1 Original I-Pod with massive storage capacity is all I really need to keep my wealth of music and video.  I am envious of the screen size where movies are concerned, but the odds of me dropping the palm sized package are much smaller and with my small screen, a catastrophic breakage seems much more unlikely.  For now I will sign off and see if I can’t manage to generate another post or two before the end of the week.  I have missed writing over the past week or two and am proud to report that the house is COMPLETELY unpacked and I can resume my more artistic endeavors with zeal.  Stay tuned, for once I am fully connected again, the content is likely to increase to epic proportions.  When a blind man’s vision is restored he likely has little use for sleep for fear that he will miss seeing something he hasn’t seen before.  Take care.  R.