Love and sweat

We went to a birthday party this weekend, and I was prepared for the worst: Shawn Joaquin hiding between my legs, or using my coat as a mask, truly believing that he's invisible when that edge of corduroy is over his face; panicked shouts of "PICK ME UP! PICK ME UP!" when a stranger looks at him, and the all-time favorite -- the t-shirt bottom pulled up over his head, belly bare but head hidden, while he stands rigid and stiff, frozen like the player in Freeze The Statue most determined to win, even if it means adults coming out after dark, hours after all the normal children have returned home, to force his arms down and his body back into a lifelike state.

All three hiding behaviors occurred within seconds, with the added bonus of pulling my coat over his head with hands sticky with peanut butter. But then a miracle occurred: the ball pit. Shawn Joaquin saw Amalie, love of his life, jump in feet first and he was off like a shot.

While I needed to remain in sight, he was still so filled with the joy of the moment and the insane FREEDOM! FREEDOM! provided by the birthday party play space that I became no more than a visual touchstone. From there he ran to put on a Snow White costume, danced in the mirror, cooked in the little kitchen, colored in Elmo pictures, did the spin-around-and-fall-down dance, threw dozens of balls back into the pit, ran in circles with his arms pumping in a completely spastic and unintegrated way, finally eating copious amounts of chocolate birthday cake and ice cream until he sank into an overwhelming sugar stupor that could only broken by Amalie's new dash for the jump house.

Now, we have a history with jump houses. A jump house has been present at multiple birthday parties in the last year. The first time Shawn Joaquin saw it, he shouted "NOT IN THERE! I NOT GO IN THERE! I SHOULDN'T GO IN THERE!!!!" This was repeated at each event with an accompanying cry of terror, sure that I would somehow shove his head under the net door and run off to the nearest cafe to enjoy 30 minutes of pure silence, the blessed quiet broken only by the sounds of the cappuccino machine and my own little moans of pleasure as I enjoyed a lemon bar -- ALL BY MYSELF, no one demanding a bite -- as his little body flailed around the rubber mat in the jump house.

Today, showing the power of love over fear, he scrambled up the rubber steps into the jump house after Amalie. I stayed inches away, on the other side of the netting, waiting for that cry of "GET ME OUT! I SHOULDN'T BE IN HERE!" but it never came. Instead, as all the other children entered and exited multiple times, he jumped. And jumped. And jumped.

His head became a sweaty mess, with rivulets of perspiration running down the sides of his head and his cheeks so pink they began to form a rash. He jumped for nearly an hour, occasionally flopping on his back, arched up by the pumped up channel beneath him, eyes glazed and chest heaving. "Are you ready to get out?" "NO, I WANNA JUMP," he'd cry, and stumble to his shaky legs to begin again. It was only when he was completely unable to stand that I made any headway, and even then it was only with the sweetener of Sesame Street at home.

He conked out on the short ride home, and was more than a little peeved that I had the audacity to insist on removing him from the car. As we walked in, Gregg was there to greet us. I couldn't wait to tell him about all the activities Shawn Joaquin had participated in, how little time he had spent under my coat.

G: "Hey, how was the party?"

SJ: "I went to the gym. I jumped a lot. Now I'm going to watch Sesame Street. Get me some milk."

G: "But, I —"

SJ: "NO MORE TALKING. I DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT THE GYM."

With that he climbed up on the sofa and stared expectantly at the dark TV, with a hand extended to the side, waiting to be filled with a cup of milk. And in that moment, the silent little prince was back.