Tantrum

It had to happen sooner or later.

It's happened sooner.

You are tantrum-abled. That is, you have the ability to throw a hissy fit, a hurricane of displeasure, an mangled opera of dis-ease. We have moved past the days when, given a new object, you could be distracted from the old (potential to do harm and/or fragile and/or belonging to Luxy) object. No longer.

The first point of contention, real contention has been Luxy's water dish. Daddy and I have uttered versions of "no," "uh-uhh," "that's Luxy's," and "stop that" so many times that the plastic mat wherein the water resides has become a sort of ceremonial center.

Next, you moved on to Luxy's kennel. The kennel is made of metal that is flaking bits of rust. The kennel has pointy places and hinges and edges and lots of potential for disaster. You love to play with the door (open, close, open, close). This seemed deeply hazardous. Well, not deeply hazardous, not like piranhas or sharks or COW'S MILK!!! but kind of hazardous. So we shut the door. But then Luxy got anxious. She likes to go inside the kennel to relax and I don't blame her. It's her space. So then we left the door open but we blocked it open with the newspaper rack so you couldn't swing it around. Then you decided you would like to go inside the kennel. Into Luxy's sacred space which happens to consist of a skanky, skanky blanket and a sheet of metal. So we told you "no."

Disaster ensued. By disaster I mean a torrent of tears, a howling of Lear-like proportions. We tried distraction. We tried lifting you up and dropping you on the other side of the room. To no avail. This is something my words cannot capture so I shall post the video. And let me explain that the video only captures the end of the tantrum--to truly understand how long this went on, you'd have to watch the video seven or eight times in a row. And you should, Thiz, you really should. Let's practice empathy. For your parents. My favorite part is when you attempt to put just your toe inside.

Addendum: the morning after this tantrum occurred, Daddy reported that the first thing you did upon arriving in the living room was to grab your favorite book from the book shelf, toddle over to the kennel, and drop it inside. Then you turned to look at him, just to make sure he'd noticed.

Luckily, you're still young enough that we mostly find all of this to be exceptionally entertaining. In a few weeks, our reactions might not be quite so congenial.