accidental shwwwooooozhing vs. a dead tree

q. shenaynay

Spuddy Buddy usually pays good attention during school, and I can count on him to give me solid narrations after readings. But this morning, as I was reading Tree in the Trail to him, I could tell he was beginning to glaze over. No, no. I stopped and closed the book.

"Well, buddy boy, you're not exercising control over your powers of attention right now, are you?" I asked.

"Ummm..." He paused to calculate his best angle. But he knows full well that The Mamadah Hath Power To Demand A Narration On The Spot. So, no way out. He turned a little pink. I was expecting him to say he was thinking about lunch or baseball. I was not expecting this:

" I was accidentally trying to get my brain out of Denver."

Denver. Oooookaaaay. Spuddy has never been to Denver, nor has he ever shown any interest in Denver other than it being the home of a sports team or three.

"Denver?"

"Yes, ma'am. Accidentally. Rockies. With snow on top. In Denver."

Seeing as how we don't have much occasion to discuss the attributes of Denver around our house, I was at least pleased to note that Spuddy was passingly aware that it's located in the Rockies. Bonus. But still.

"Sweetie, we are reading about a tree on the dusty Santa Fe trail. In New Mexico. So why is your brain up in the Rockies in Denver, Colorado?"

(I should probably helpfully interject a shameful confession here, before you continue, that Spuddy, yes Spuddy, son of a veteran Charlotte Mason devotee, spends a wee bit too much time reading Calvin & Hobbes books. Now you know. Please proceed accordingly.)

Spuddy's eyes grew large and wild and he began speaking in his mega-enthused superboy voice:

"Well, I was sort of accidentally imagining that I was mining inside a humongous mountain outside Denver and I accidentally poked a hole all the way through the top of the mountain, and all the snow on top of the mountain came swooshing down on top of my head and then the cold, cold snow crashing down on top of me just -- shwwwwwwooooozh!!! -- slid me all the way back down the mining passage I had dug and I whooshed all the way down to the place where I had started outside the mountain and then I kept whooshing down all the way back into town. And so then I just went back to the hotel where we were staying. Because I was pretty cold."

Oh. Right. Okay.

So tell me, friends. Do ya think there's any chance of getting a boy who's just whooshed shwwwwwooooozh! from the top of the inside of the Rockies all the way out and down to a Denver hotel to return to a tale about a dead tree on a dusty trail?

I will try again tomorrow. Yes. I will. Ten years to go with this one. Lord, help me.