Count Manchego – 4 years old, Star Pupil of the Day at La Crèche KinderCollege, Oct. 2nd, 3rd, and Nov. 25th, Edmund’s nephew, lives in Canberra, Australia.
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Count Manchego, 24 July 2010 – Naptime
I like cars.
I especially like blue cars and green cars.
And I like to get cars as presents.
And I don't like Edmund Callipeaux.
Perhaps I need to elaborate. I’ll back up a bit….
As I have established, I like cars.
And by cars, I mean Hot Wheels! Matchbox are okay toy cars too. But the best are Hot Wheels and my favorites are blue or green (although any color will do…they’re all pretty good).
Speaking of cars, my aunt LeTigre and her husband, Uncle Ed came to visit us and they had cars.
I should add here that I usually economize the pronunciation and spelling of words to save time. Such as shortening my auntie LeTigre’s name to just T’gre (Tee – Gra). This saves me a lot of time in both typing and talking. I actually do this with all sorts of words. Say for instance if her name were, Erica. I would call her, Er’ka (Air – Ka). I’m only four years old and I’m up on that whole text messaging, instant messaging thing. I don't have time for any words over 2 syllables long.
That’s how we 4-year-olds roll.
We’re fast-rollers.
We’re busy.
And we like cars.
I’ve included a few photos that I shot while T’gre and Ed visited me in Australia. (I don’t need to abbreviate his name – it’s already short – or maybe I could call him Uncle E – or better, Ünk’E.)
These photos that I took are of some my favorite memories from their vacation.
Those were photos of us having dinner at a fancy restaurant, but my little finger somehow got in the way.
On the first day of their visit, T’gre gave me 2 cars, and I thought that was sweet.
And on the second day of their visit, T’gre gave me 3 cars, and I thought that that was also sweet!
I then worked it out in my head:
2 cars the 1st day and 3 the 2nd – that’s 2.5 cars per day….
“They’ll be here another 7 days…. that’s an additional 17.5 cars!”
Sweet!
Factor in T’gre and Ünk’E’s tendencies toward impulsive shopping and I could be looking at 20+ cars by the end of the week.
This was to be a sweet week!
We did all sorts of great things while T’gre and Ünk’E were in town. Stuff like watching the television show, Bob a Builder.
I understand that the show’s real name is, Bob the Builder. However, I have learned that there are many, many other construction workers, or “builders” out there working and building things in this great big world. So, I have decided to refer to Bob with the more egalitarian term “a”, rather than granting him divine or god-like status as denoted through, “the Builder.”
I digress…
We went to the beach and walked on a path.
We drove around.
Now that I’m thinking about it, it’s probably too much to say that I don’t like my Ünk’E.
Please forgive me for making that statement.
We 4-year-olds tend to see things in extreme terms (e.g. good or bad, yummy or gross, poopy or not poopy). We have a tough time with the concept of a grey area, or qualifiers that fall between great and terrible. Ünk’E isn’t terrible, it’s just that he’s not as great as my Auntie T’gre. I guess that doesn't place him into the “bad” category by default, but as a 4-year-old, I sometimes have a tough time with these complex social equations.
In my mind, if you like peanut butter, you like peanut butter. If you don’t, you don’t.
There is no inbetween.
Or, I could ask your opinion about cheesy-vegemite sandwiches.
What do you think of that stuff?
Yummy or gross?
I think that stuff is great. Check me off in the yummy category!
But grown-ups can be confusing on these issues.
Take, for instance, the word, Fart.
Hilarious!
It’s an hilarious word. No one can deny it. The word fart, alongside its compatriots, poop, butt, and booger form a Pantheon of the funniest words ever invented in the English Language. And yet, when I use one or more of them in the same sentence, I get into trouble!
That does not make sense.
Case in point....
Ünk’E told us this really funny story where he used the word fart at least 20 times. I was laughing so hard by the end that I could hardly stand it anymore!
Hilarious, right?
Yes.
And yet, later when I began to chant that same word, over and over, I got into trouble!
Can you imagine that?!!
The whole thing is very confusing. I’ve studied adults for more than 4 years now, and I can tell you with a great amount of certainty that they value humor. In fact, they devote a lot of time and energy to humor: They commit to memory humorous situations, stories, and anecdotes. They laugh and they enjoy laughter. They joke. They do and say amusing and comedic things for the joyful benefit of themselves and their friends, families, and sometimes even strangers. There’s even a comedy section at the DVD store. And yet if I say the word fart outside the context of having myself just farted, such as, “Excuse me, I just farted…”
Then I’m in trouble!
And that’s not fair because saying it like that isn’t even that funny!
According to old people, being funny is good, and yet somehow I am restricted from this behavior. It doesn't make sense. But then again, as I get older, I am discovering that this world makes less and less sense. Things used to be so simple. Perhaps I myself will grow up and become so confusing that one day a 4-year-old will not fully comprehend my reasoning?
Probably not though.
Very doubtful.
These are a few photos of us driving around in a real car.
And so after T’gre and Ünk’E left Australia to return to their home in the USA, I compiled these photographs to share with you. Auntie T’gre really understands me and we spent hours playing with cars and also trains while they were here. (Did I mention that I’m also a big fan of the Thomas the Tank Engine television show - - as well as the corresponding series of toy trains?)
Ünk’E gave me a light-brown Carhartt sweater with a hood. If I had a better understanding of sarcasm, I would have done that thing where I hold my hand up to my mouth and fake doing a yawn as I told him how much I liked his present.
But I knew that I couldn’t pull that off.
That’s why T’gre is my favorite between her and Ünk’E. She understands me. It’s easy: I like cars (or Thomas trains) and she likes cars too (and Thomas trains too). Ünk’E likes boring old Carhartt sweater’s that are pretty good, but not as good as cars.
Hey!
Wait a minute, maybe I just cracked the code to that whole good vs. bad thing?
Carhartt sweaters are good, but cars are better! They’re both good, but one is definitely much, much better. (Wow, this is complicated!) So, by that twisted reasoning, Ünk’E may not be as great as T’gre, but he is still okay in some respects. (Wow! This is really complicated!)
Ünk’E may not be a big dumb-dumb?
I don’t know; all this is too much for me to process.
I did begin this essay by stating that I preferred blue- or green-colored cars…while at the same time stating that cars of any color are good. That logically leads to questions…. How can two things both be good and yet one is better than the other? It’s like places: Minneapolis is a place, St. Paul is a place, and Minnesota is a place too. And yet 2 of those places are in the other place! How the heck does that work? I was in all 3 of these places about 2 years ago and I remember spending most of my time trying to figure out where the heck I was!
This stuff is so confusing!
Well, despite all this very complicated craziness, I do have my cars, Ünk’E is maybe an okay guy, T’gre is definitely an awesome auntie, and at the end of the day, I have my cars and I have my skills as a photographer!
