What’s a normal morning like in our humble little abode?
Our family slumbers peacefully as dreams of bunnies, cotton candy, and Jennifer Aniston fill the air.
My eight-year-old son slowly raises his head, steadies his eyes and surveys the room to see if there’s even the slightest smidge of sunlight creeping through the blinds.
He then climbs backwards down the ladder from his loft.
Half way down he stops, places feet side by side, then leaps landing firmly on the ground as if this swan-like move would set-off sparkles, lights, and song birds filling the air with joyous sounds celebrating Grayson’s entry into a new day.
Instead, I leap five feet in the air screaming “WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?!!!” as the windows still rattle.
Just then the boy walks by our room naked except for his little tighty-whities on his way to the bathroom.
I lay back down trying to calm myself as I listen to his pee randomly hit the floor, then the toilet water, then the floor, then the toilet water. I try to figure out what he’s spelling.
Just as I begin to find a happy place, WAM!!!! The sound of the toilet seat and lid slamming onto the porcelain of the bowl has me clawing at the sheets.
My wife…sleeps through every second of this.
As he walks by I firmly whisper, “Grayson!! Stop being so loud. Your sister doesn’t go into school till 11 a.m.!! We want her to sleep AND you’re gonna wake up the dog!!”
“Fiiiiiinnnnuh daddy!” he says in a louder than normal tone reeking of “what the hell’s your problem old man?”
I look at the clock and see he’s up 15 minutes before the alarm was set. I reach over and just as I start to turn the alarm off I hear, RUFF….RUFF…..RUFF!!!
Followed by my son screaming at the top of his lungs, “DADDY???!!! I CAN’T FIND A MATCHING SOCK!!!”
The wife picks her head off the pillow reaching for her phone to see what time it is just as a tear forms in the corner of my eye.
I slowly rise and throw on some clothes. As I walk out of my room I run smack into the daughter who’s carrying her blanky and headed towards the stairs.
“Morning daddy! Can I have cereal? I’m hungry?,” she says in her precious little princess voice a mere four-and-a-half hours before she needs to be at school.
“DADDY?!!,” screams the boy who’s standing literally seven feet away, “did you find a sock? And I don’t want cereal…can you make waffles?”
“I don’t want waffles!!!,” screams the darling six-year-old girl as the dog is now clawing at his cage while yipping and barking to join in the hellish ordeal taking place at 6:30 a.m.
And from there it continues.
All because of my loud-ass son.
