Monday, June 21, 2004
On Sharing
I picked Max up from school a little early today. When I arrived, he was fast asleep, positioned like a lumpy triangle, cheek pressed to the mat, bottom in the air. I don't know how much longer he'll settle himself in this charming, childlike pose, but I will surely miss it when he's left it behind. Although I could have contented myself with watching him, he lifted his sleepy head as soon as I greeted his teachers.
I had decided that our adventure on the way home would be a detour to Patisserie for a cookie. So to whet our appetites, I asked him what kind of cookie he wanted. Sugar cookie? Chocolate chip? Oatmeal raisin? Giving choices to your toddler is widely recommended in parenting books, but the strategy sometimes backfires with Max. Vascillating among his options, he can reach such heights that his dismount often resembles a full meltdown with two and a half twists. Fortunately, this was not his destiny today. He announced confidently, "Peanut butter. They're on the bottom row."
And so they were. But Max's choice wasn't your mother's peanut-butter-cookie-with- fork-tine-imprints-on-top. It was a peanut butter and jelly sandwich cookie, meaning, as the name would imply, TWO peanut butter cookies married with a thin layer of jelly. I considered the consequences of this sugar infusion at 3:00 in the afternoon and acquiesced anyway. For me, I chose a snickerdoodle.
We sat down at a green bistro table, Max's legs dangling restlessly. A bite into our cookies, Max decided that he wanted to try my snickerdoodle. I permitted him a bite. Then he wanted another. Soon he had confiscated the snickerdoodle in its entirety. So, as quid pro quo, I broke bite-sized pieces off the top half of his peanut butter cookie. Watching as I began to disassemble his cookie, Max broke into pieces, too. "That's my cookie!" he began to wail. I stopped encroaching and explained to him that because he had eaten mine, it was only fair that I get to eat some of his. I sat back to let him think on this and collect himself. He didn't look persuaded by my rationale.
A few minutes later, in what appeared to be a spontaneous burst of generosity, Max declared, "Mommy, I want to share with you." Having put this offer on the table, Max took careful stock of his cookie inventory. All that remained in his hands were two pieces of the peanut butter cookie, one larger than the other by a factor of three. His eyes shifted back and forth between the two pieces. Then, with great deliberation, he took two bites from the larger piece. Now he appraised the two morsels again, and finding the comparison more to his liking, he offered me the piece that had just been reduced by two-thirds. "Here, mommy. This is for you!"
At the dinner table this evening, Max gave Lee his version of events at Patisserie: "I ate my cookie and mommy's cookie. And I shared my cookie with mommy." King Solomon might not have adjudicated it a fair and equitable division of cookies, but Max's account was all true, just the same.
I had decided that our adventure on the way home would be a detour to Patisserie for a cookie. So to whet our appetites, I asked him what kind of cookie he wanted. Sugar cookie? Chocolate chip? Oatmeal raisin? Giving choices to your toddler is widely recommended in parenting books, but the strategy sometimes backfires with Max. Vascillating among his options, he can reach such heights that his dismount often resembles a full meltdown with two and a half twists. Fortunately, this was not his destiny today. He announced confidently, "Peanut butter. They're on the bottom row."
And so they were. But Max's choice wasn't your mother's peanut-butter-cookie-with- fork-tine-imprints-on-top. It was a peanut butter and jelly sandwich cookie, meaning, as the name would imply, TWO peanut butter cookies married with a thin layer of jelly. I considered the consequences of this sugar infusion at 3:00 in the afternoon and acquiesced anyway. For me, I chose a snickerdoodle.
We sat down at a green bistro table, Max's legs dangling restlessly. A bite into our cookies, Max decided that he wanted to try my snickerdoodle. I permitted him a bite. Then he wanted another. Soon he had confiscated the snickerdoodle in its entirety. So, as quid pro quo, I broke bite-sized pieces off the top half of his peanut butter cookie. Watching as I began to disassemble his cookie, Max broke into pieces, too. "That's my cookie!" he began to wail. I stopped encroaching and explained to him that because he had eaten mine, it was only fair that I get to eat some of his. I sat back to let him think on this and collect himself. He didn't look persuaded by my rationale.
A few minutes later, in what appeared to be a spontaneous burst of generosity, Max declared, "Mommy, I want to share with you." Having put this offer on the table, Max took careful stock of his cookie inventory. All that remained in his hands were two pieces of the peanut butter cookie, one larger than the other by a factor of three. His eyes shifted back and forth between the two pieces. Then, with great deliberation, he took two bites from the larger piece. Now he appraised the two morsels again, and finding the comparison more to his liking, he offered me the piece that had just been reduced by two-thirds. "Here, mommy. This is for you!"
At the dinner table this evening, Max gave Lee his version of events at Patisserie: "I ate my cookie and mommy's cookie. And I shared my cookie with mommy." King Solomon might not have adjudicated it a fair and equitable division of cookies, but Max's account was all true, just the same.
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