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“Mom?” my eleven-year-old asked me at the breakfast table this morning. “Is it possible to get surgery to make your eyes better than 20-20?”
“Uhhhh,” I stuttered. “The Bionic Man could see through walls, I think,” I offered feebly. Disappointed, he sighed. Rubbing my temples, I offered, “I would think that even if your eyes could see that well, your brain couldn’t process it.”
This is the kind of kitchen table conversation that baffles me. I can guess answers to my son’s difficult questions, but mostly, I have to Google them. And there’s no computer in the kitchen. Suddenly, my nine-year-old rescued me.
“Phelps won another gold!” he announced.
“Lemme see,” his big brother said. And then the two of them read the sports section of The New York Times together while I took in the moment. As a long-time news junkie, this was for me one of those pivotal parenting events — the minute you realize your kids might be interested in one of your favorite hobbies: taking in the news. Also, that breakfast is going to be a lot easier on me for the next 10 days.
“Must be all those eggs and pizza,” my younger son said, a reference to the news story we had watched on TV earlier this week about Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps’ 12,000 calorie-a-day training diet.
It’s been like this all week. Thanks to the Olympics, we have something more to talk about than my son’s (stump Mom) medical hypothesis. Besides, it’s August, the getting-on-each-other’s nerves stage of summer when I spend a lot of time breaking up fights between the boys.
But the Olympics and the news surrounding it have taken the edge off the dog days of summer. As a result, there’s less “He knocked over my bike!” and more “Did you hear that the Chinese used another girl’s voice to sing in the opening cermonies? Cheaters!”
En route to drama camp yesterday, my sons shushed the other kids in the carpool when the Olympics news came on the radio.
“Did you hear that? James Blake beat Federer!” my nine-year-old announced incredulously. His big brother added, “Maybe USA will get a medal in tennis,” while the other kids stared blankly. I explained that my sons were talking about how an American tennis player had defeated the number one ranked men’s single’s player in the world. They nodded politely, and changed the subject.
Wait’ll my boys hear the news that Blake lost today to a Chilean in a marathon of a third set that wen to 11-9 in 81 minutes. Or that the women’s soccer team advanced to the semifinals. They’re going to want to record Monday’s game so we can watch it when we eat breakfast.
But if we’re too busy to watch it then, there’s always the news.
– Posted by Jen Singer
Filed under Tweens
