Danger Danger

THIS IS SOMETHING I WROTE A COUPLE OF YEARS AGO: HOPE IT RELATES.
DANGER DANGER
Once you become a parent, apart from the fact that you find out you can talk about all the qualities of poop for hours, you tend to see danger everywhere. We're all on the over/under protective spectrum somewhere. My wonderful husband truly thinks that I just favor fun at all times regardless of the risks. I tell him that I refuse to live in the fetal position all my life. One day as I was reading the Cat in the Hat, It suddenly dawned on me that my idol was the cat and his was the fish. We had a wonderful conversation regarding our cat and fish viewpoints. “Well somebody's got to be the fish” was his viewpoint, well-taken. Children need cats and fish in their lives, of course not battling it out constantly as often happens, but gently tempering each other and settling at some middle ground (that's fine in my house but the middle ground absolutely must be on MY territory). Contrary to what may appear to be NOT going on in my head, when my kids do do dangerous things it's because: A: I have put a lot of thought and calculation into the perceived risk involved - “is someone going to accidentally hang themselves from that rope...exactly how much damage can one do if they fall from the tree house – will they break their arm or their neck (there's a big difference). The relatively low height of the tree house is not an accident. It was all planned out by me, and the danger versus fun and developmental need for -you name it- factor has all been taken into account. Or B: I am just too exhausted to do anything about it and I make a quick calculation of the odds of anything really dangerous happening and just hope for the best. Apparently, I do not “freak out” enough for my husband's taste. He would be much more comfortable if he heard my silent screams audibly. He has finally agreed to settle for the fact that “I'm freaking out inside, OK?” “OK as long as I know you're freaking out”. I didn't spend twenty years perfecting the art of NOT freaking out while working with emotionally whatever-the-current-politically-correct-term-is-now- kids for NOTHING you know! The stories I could tell about the King Street Kids and their antics could chill you to the bone. I know that working with and raising kids is a chess-game. They make a move, we anticipate their next move while planning our own, and so on. You don't see chess players jumping up, flailing their arms and saying “Don't you dare move that pawn there – don't you know you're going to kill yourself?!!!?” I save those antics for really serious things. I certainly did freak out when my fifteen-month old ran into the road when a car was coming. I'm not completely crazy!