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The Science of Motherhood
Modern technologies seem like magic to a primitive man. Children are often similarly awed by the scientific genius of their mothers. Years of experimentation, testing hypotheses, and verifying conclusions develop in mom what appears to be an ability to see through walls, or read minds. We take our work as seriously as any research physicist, and consider it a sacred responsibility to add to the body of our colleague’s knowledge. This is the stuff of Professional Mom meetings all over the world. Here a few excerpts from my lab notes:
If You Smell It, Find It!
The corollary is: Odors only get worse. For example – diapers stuck between couch sections, milk bottles rolled under the bed, pumpkins you never had time to carve left in the hall closet, earthworms dug up and saved for fishing in boys’ sock drawers, sweet potatoes left in jars to grow (water evaporated long ago), aquarium escapees who (sadly) took advantage of the missing cover, unwanted asparagus tucked surreptitiously into a drawer beside the dinner table.
If You Don’t See It, Pay Attention!
Elements missing from the environment are often significant. Vinegar and baking soda missing from the pantry simultaneously signals a coming volcanic eruption courtesy of your budding Einstein. Missing step stools, flashlights, screwdrivers, rug-cleaning powder, pliers or scissors should put mom on red alert.
Following up on a pair of missing tongs, I once narrowly averted a flushed-underwear disaster. If my friend Maureen had only noticed the can of mushroom soup missing before she preheated the oven, she might not have been cleaning roasted soup from every surface of her kitchen after the explosion! See what I mean?
If You See a Trail, Follow It!
Those eighteen toys dribbled along the hall toward the bathroom are a warning you must not ignore. (Okay, I admit it – I still haven’t gotten over finding every toy and book Jeremy owned in an overflowing bathtub 26 years ago!) An ant trail may lead to the secret food supply for the pioneers defending their living room fort against savage Indians. You may not rescue your wall from green tempera fingerprints, but the trail might help you save the couch.
A trail of sheet rock dust may prevent another peephole being drilled from within a spy kid’s closet. All those drops of blood on the floor may or may not be a food color April fool’s joke. Follow the trail of stuffing and get the victim to the Stuffed Animal Hospital before it’s too late. A long line of kids in the backyard may be a parade, or a future intrepid explorer leading everyone he could round up on an expedition into the woods just across the four-lane speedway.
The principle is: It’s a TRAIL – Check it out!
If You Hear Anything, Discover the Source!
And its corollary – If You Don’t Hear Anything, Find Out Why!
The experienced momologist will know it is often the sound of silence that bodes most ill. Loud sounds have nothing on tiny ‘Uh-ohs’ and whispered ‘Don’t tell Mom yet’s’ for signaling disaster. Sure, there are the occasional giant ceiling-shaking thuds from rooms with bunk beds that give one pause, but without attendant blood curdling screams, they’re hardly worth putting down your murder mystery to investigate.
There is really very little noise associated with backed up overstuffed-toilet water trickling through the ceiling into your light fixture, or with a child removing labels from every can in the pantry, or from a phone with a forgotten caller listening in on you swearing you’re about to send all your kids to an adoption agency (yes, that one little ring was your only warning!).
Above all things, learn the sound of conspiracy between siblings. Kids in cahoots is a noise you don’t want to miss! Silence may be bliss, but it doesn’t tell you where they are and exactly what they’re doing. Don’t trust it!
Do Not Expect ‘Common Sense’ From Kids!
What seems obvious to you, an experienced scientist, is not necessarily clear to the junior investigators that surround you. Putting several hundred very small pieces of toilet paper in the potty instead of three or four loooooong sheets does not actually change the total volume, or the awful results. The butter knife really can cut if you saw across your arm at just the right (wrong?) angle.
Making little holes in the vacuum cleaner bag will not help it suck in more dirt. Reversing the audio and video plugs on the VCR won’t allow the movie characters to get out into the room. Just because Daddy said toothpaste would get the scratches off CD’s doesn’t mean you can take a toothbrush to the music collection with gusto. You might try telling them a few of these postulates, but don’t expect them to ‘take’ without hands-on discovery.
This advice may make motherhood seem too daunting a science for you to master, but hang in there. And remember the most important entry in my well-thumbed lab book: Don’t Tell the Kids How You Know! If they ever stop leaving clues, you’re sunk. Meanwhile, let them think you have eyes in the back of your head and guardian angels as secret agents.
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