I am happy to say that, unlike most parents, I can actually pinpoint the date on which Aidan surpassed his father in the area of brilliance. It was yesterday, March 23, and it happened after a long day for everyone.

Upon returning home, beaten by life, I encountered my son asleep on the couch. My wife told me he had been snoozing for about a half-hour and that her attempts to waken him had been unsuccessful. I went over to him, said hello quietly and brushed his hair. He made a groan that seemed to say, "If you don't get away from me right now, I am going to kill you."

We Kaye men are known for our violent, if not overly wordy, groans.

He turned over and went back to sleep. A few minutes later I tried again, only to be met with an identical experience. By the third time, I just knelt down next to him and whispered, "Do you want me to carry you upstairs?" To me surprise, he nodded and wheezed a tiny "yes."

I scooped him up and made my way upstairs. Since he is 6 and I am old and feeble, maneuvering the stairs was not as simple as I would have liked. The fact that I didn't bash his head into the wall, banister, window or door was remarkable.

We crept into his room and I gently put him on the bed. As I was about to make my getaway, a small but strong voice said, "My eyes are open, you know."

Nex thing I knew, we were on our way back downstairs. He was too fully awake to be in bed; heck, it was even still light outside. But his groans returned and I offered (for reasons I cannot fathom) to carry him downstairs on my back. He was happy to take that ride, and within minutes we were back where we began.

How this proves that Aidan is smarter than me is the mere fact that, based on a groan, I carried him all the way upstairs, gently and slowly so as to not wake him. He was evidently very much wide awake and was seeing all this as a big joke. Then, after the fraud was revealed, I offered to carry him back downstairs.

These are not the actions of a healthy mind. These are the actions of a father, head over heels in love with his child. And when that happens, and when the dad realizes how helpless he is over it, the child has won. The student has become the master.

Next time, I'm making sure the little monster is asleep. Where's my ibuprofen?

Labels: autumn, child, dad, dadography, parenting

It's hot and I'm sweating. The flowers are drooping, the cats are drooping, our droopings are drooping. So what time of year is it? Why, time to get ready for Halloween, of course!

My son, Aidan, 5, loves Halloween. Well, "love" is kind of a weak word for it. Let me explain it thusly - for Aidan, there is no time that is not Halloween-y by its very existence. It is either just past Halloween, or on the way to next Halloween. Oh, well, there's that period of time when it is exactly Halloween, but that date is left open to interpretation...his.

So when we stopped by Michael's Craft Store and saw a few Halloween things lying about, the calendar shifted and summer was virtually at an end. By the time we got home with our $1.99 foam skeleton, costumes had been discussed - for this year and next - and plans were being percolated inside his little skull for a Haunted House unlike anything the world had ever seen.

To be fair, this wasn't his first Halloween jolt. A few months back he saw - oh I don't know - a bird, and that got him to obsessing about how it should be Halloween soon. Suddenly I am making paper ghosts, darkening my home office to make things scary and pretending to be terrified every time I saw the faint glow of a dying flashlight focused on a colored rubber pumpkin from last year.

So here it is August and I'm deep into Halloween territory. I suspect that the next 10 weeks will be chock full of booing and vampires and things that go bump in the night. Well, maybe until 12:01 a.m. November 1, when Christmas slams into the house.

Labels: aidan, autumn, Halloween