Tractors, Dirt-piles and Bullies.

Since we overstayed our welcome at Playgroop yesterday and then dawdled around that neighborhood eating hummus and stopping at every motorcycle, I thought P'd want to stay in today. It started that way, with his breakfast of Sun Drops (basically M&M's without food coloring) and smoothie, until he heard a tractor roaring down our street. This reminded him he had seen tractors parked down the block and he was quite eager to watch them work. After a quick shower (during which he read a book to himself! It was only last month that my cleanliness was still intricately tied to his dismay. For the past 2 weeks I've been able to shower without a hiccup, nary a tear in sight.) and a quick lunch we headed out for tractors and then the library.

One block over is a lovely disaster. There was a back-hoe, 2 dump-trucks, a bulldozer and a few more machines scattered around for good measure. Plus workers, pipes, wood, generators, water suckers - the whole works. They've ripped open the street and there is a gully that runs 2 stories deep showing the infrastructure of the city below. The guys were on lunch break so P and I were able to tour the machines and stand at the top of the gulch, discussing what we saw. After about 20 minutes of heaven a nice worker came over and offered P a ride in his machine. He was a bit hesitant, but climbed up. Then the guys were back to work and P was riveted for another 20 minutes. We were supposed to meet his buddy, M, at the library, so he finally tore himself away, waving to all of the men in hard-hats.

After some fun picking books and treating the library steps and ramps like a jungle gym P and M parted ways for M to nap. Phoenix has really been on a no nap kick lately. He told me he was tired but that he didn't want to sleep :) But he was in his "zone" so I steered him towards a nice quiet space in the park where he couldn't run in front of any cars or kick anybody's lunch over. It was a really beautiful fall day and we sat by a new outdoor sculpture framed by a large garden and P dove into a dirt pile with his cars. Its wonderful to see someone play in the dirt with such abandon :)

When some rougher big kids and their post-school nannies overtook the area we decided to head home to read his new books. As we were leaving 2 of the boys acted fairly aggressively towards P. He was uncomfortable but stood his ground, pointing his little finger at them he said "No. I no want to play with you."

He stands so strong, but you can tell he doesn't understand that type of interaction. He's really been struggling with the concept of "not nice" lately. Its like a world he knows is there but doesn't get on any level. He wants books with scary ghosts and mean monsters. He wants stories that are a little edgy, but then he changes his request as we start to spin our tale, telling us "It a nice king. Not a mean king. That king nice?"

After the dirt-pile we were reading a book and out of seemingly nowhere he asked me "Why mean boys throw sand in my face and on my tractor?" This incident occurred a couple of months ago at the playground. E and I were both there and couldn't believe it when two older boys jumped in an otherwise empty sandpit and started to taunt P. We were sitting a ways away on a bench and held back, seeing P stand his ground. Then they started tossing sand on his tractor. By the time our butts were off the bench they had both flung handfuls of sand into P's face. The whole interaction lasted less than 30 seconds and appeared to have no purpose. We had to flush P's eyes for 3 or 4 minutes before he could see again. He's been resistant to that playground ever since, but has never brought it up until today. It broke my heart to realize he had been trying to puzzle it together for so long and that the two bullies today had conjured it back up. But when he asked me, I realized I still feel like I'm missing the same puzzle piece. Why are people mean?

I think its a harder concept to chat about than his other obsession, Death, because at least death seems to have a purpose. Its great that he leads a life where meanness can be such an enigma rather than a given, but since it is so novel, it really shocks him when he sees it. So he introduces it into his play regularly these days with one car being rough with the others, a mean TRex that crushes cars, a monster that chases us, or, just recently, a mean troll that lived under a bridge he had constructed for his cars. After playing that game for a bit the other day he stopped and asked me why the troll was "not nice" and I gave my usual, "I'm not sure P, what do you think?" "He probably just needs a friend," he told me. And I think he may have found our puzzle piece. Queue the Beatles and "All you need is love..."