It's Hot

Some lessons are best learned through first hand experience....as much as I would like that not to be true.

This past Saturday was beautiful; sunny, cool and clear.  I was loving it.  I was also off for the morning to get my hair done- YAY! 

Tom and the kids were hanging at the house - Saturday is daddy's day to make breakfast because he apparently does a better job than I do (he also allows the kids to eat just breakfast meat if they so desire; hey, whatever) so my absence was not straining the routine by any means.

When I left the house at 8:30 am, all was well.  The kids were just getting out of bed and Tom was...not sure, but he was home.  As I proceded out the door, Luke ran after me and asked that I stop at Lowes on the way home and get orange paint for the shelf he wanted to paint and put in his room.  No problem, I can do that.

Feeling like a new woman, I left the hairdresser.  As I drove down the highway, I remembered that I told Luke I would stop and get him paint.  I quick swung into Lowes to get paint.  ...Side note; I was reminded why I do not shop at stores like that, especially on a Saturday - Motherly Love was in full affect as I battled the people and lines.

OK, homeward bound.  I pull in the driveway and see my husband burning leaves, etc. in the side yard (yes, we still live in an area where you can do that).  I am not going to lie, my first thought was, "if I walk in this house and find these kids in their PJ's watching TV, I am going to be annoyed", but I held my tongue until I checked out the situation.  I walked in the house and called for both kids and no one answered, "Oh, good, they must be outside somewhere". 

I poked around the kitchen and thought Tom did a pretty good job cleaning up from his breakfast feast.  As I turned to set the paint down, I noticed Tom go running across the back yard; then I noticed Luke at the windows by the dinning room frantically trying to unwind the hose and yelling back to his dad that he was going as fast as he could.  I then saw Cora charging for the house.  Tom was again yelling at Luke to turn the water on full blast....Luke was trying, but I could see that he was scared and getting frustrated.  Luke grabbed the coil of hose and started dragging it across the back yard......

I ran out the back door and ran into Cora who said "mom, all we did was start sticks on fire to make torches and then we stuck them in the ground; we were trying to make a row of burning torches"  What?
I yelled out to Tom "what is going on?" as I ran over to Luke and helped him hustle with the hose -- Then I saw it, the edge of our woods was smoldering....

Tom was busy putting out the fire, so I asked Luke what happened.  Luke said that he and Cora (and Cora added "it was Luke's idea) were taking sticks, placing them in the fire and then sticking them in the ground, in a row, like torches.  Before they knew it, the wind had knocked them down and the edge of the woods was on fire - It scared the you know what out of both of them!

Tom got the fire put out and then proceeded to lecture Luke about the situation.  You see, this is not the first time the kids, especially Luke, has "played" with fire.  These kids (like many) are drawn to fire like a moth to the flame.  Countless times (at bonfires, burning in our own fire pit, etc.) we have told both the kids, but particularly Luke, to stop playing with the fire (burning sticks, swinging sticks around, throwing items in the fire to see if they will burn).  It went in one ear and out the other....exhausting.

This time was different.  I could see it in Luke's eyes.  He was scared and he understood (I think for the first time) why we had asked him all those other times not to play with the fire(s).  The speed at which this situation was out of his control scared him.  It was an ah ha moment for my 8 year old. 

Tom "cooled" down so to speak and went behind the shop to tend to his fire (he had two going at one time; no comment from the mom) and Luke looked at me and said "mom, you can take away anything you want, I can't believe that I did that, that was dumb- you guys are always telling me not to play with fire - I should have listened"  I could tell that this little boy had just learned an important life lesson.  Luke then went back to where Tom was and on his own apologized to his dad and said he would never do something like that again.  Tom forgave him and then said no DS for a week to which Luke said a simple "OK" - In that moment I was confident that Luke would not play with fire again.

While my preference as a mom would be to have my children listen so they don't have to experience the consequences of not listening, the ah ha moment for me was, yes, even through adulthood, there is something very powerful about experiencing firsthand (good or bad) as opposed to just being told to or not to do something.  The power of experiences!  ....so thankful this time it did not result in our woods totally catching on fire!

Somehow that request for orange paint seems very symbolic now.