Magic!

Well, I am just blown away. We were visiting grandparents this weekend, and it was Hazel's turn to pick our Family Fun activity for the weekend. We gave her a couple of choices and she chose the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. Toby was also excited for that, to see the flowers. But then it began to rain, so we needed to find an indoor idea. There is a tiny marionette theatre on the corner of my mother's block, and Hazel agreed that going to the puppet show could be our activity. Toby asked what he could do instead, and I explained that it was Haz's turn to choose something for us all to do together. He did not like that one bit. He started to cry and said it's not Family Fun if he hates puppet shows. I don't think he's ever seen one - we did try to go to this place with him years ago, and left because he was scared of the dark. I explained the system again, that each person gets a chance to choose, and everyone else has to do it even if they don't want to - in exchange for the same when it's their turn. I reminded him that he had had his turn a couple of weeks ago, and would again in two more weeks. Crying! Screaming! I could feel my mother's eyes burning into the back of me, watching how I handled it. Then he asked what we would do for him if he went to the show. What?? He said, "Either you do something special for me, or we're not going.". Oh, so fresh!! I said no, that was not the case - I managed to remain very calm and resist the urge to say Oh Really, Buster! I invited him to offer Hazel another indoor activity she might agree to instead. More crying and screaming. Then I said that it looked to me like our system of choosing a family activity was not working, did he agree? Yes. This is a problem, yes? Yes. So maybe what should happen is for him to put it on the Problem List when we get home, and at next Family Meeting we'll see if we can come up with a different way to do it. He agreed to that, and got calmer. I just waited to see what would come next. Then he said, "if, when we go out to get dessert, you get something separate for Hazel, then I'll go to the puppet show.". Deal! We shook on it, everyone was fine, they each got their own goddamn tootsie roll, we went to the puppet show and they both loved it. Hot damn. My mom was pretty impressed.