The Trouble with Tommy

If you’ve been reading this blog for awhile you’ve read the stories where Chris and Tommy are transformed into adults in various eras – Ancient Rome, The Wild West. In each case I’ve tried to project their current personality into the adult characters they’ve become for that particular story. So you may have a sense, if you’ve read those stories, about how each boy differs from the other.

Let me preface what I’m going to say next with a disclaimer – both boys are young. I’m not trying to typecast them or label them in any way. The personality traits they exhibit a year from now may be very different from how they act today. They may, in fact, both grow up to be model citizens; fine, upstanding young men.

Having said that, it’s also quite possible one of them might give me a heart attack before he becomes a teenager.

Can you guess which one?

Chris is a lot like me. Too much, perhaps. Physically he is, and pretty much has been since the day he was born, a dead ringer for me. His personality is similar to mine as well. He is thoughtful, considerate, a bit introspective (as much as one can be at age five). He wants to please, he hates to disappoint. He’s a very social boy, likes to make friends, and he generally gets along with and plays well with others. He will usually do as he’s told, follow the rules, and work within the system.

He does have an impish streak. He will occasionally tease his brother or play a trick on him, but it is usually in fun and not mean-spirited. He’s a bit possessive over his toys, but what kid isn’t at this age? Even when he’s acting a bit naughty, more often than not we can reason with him and help him solve problems by talking through the different ways they might be handled. Usually he’ll see the light and choose the right solution.

Tommy, on the other hand, is none of the above.

Tommy Two-Gun. Tomas’ the Fierce.

Tommy is a maverick. A spitfire. If he doesn’t get his way, he’s as likely to take a swing at you as he is to cry and stomp his feet. If he doesn’t care for his dinner, he might sit there and chew one bite for ten full minutes. He might sit there and not eat it at all. He might just get up and walk away from the table. Or he might, as he did the other night, take his peas, one by one, and launch them across the kitchen. Laughing all the while.

He has his own time zone. Tommy Standard Time. Which means that he’ll go somewhere when he’s good and ready. Not when everyone else is ready – when he’s ready. Example - we’re trying to leave the grocery store the other evening, and he’s looking at the gumball vending machine.

“Tommy, come on, time to go home.”

“Okay, dad.” Not moving.

“Tommy, come on!”

“Okay, dad.” Not moving.

“TOMMY!”

He turns, looks at me, exasperation written all over his little face.

“Just a minute, okay? Geez!”

As I turn to walk back and physically lift him off his feet, he begins to walk toward me. Slowly.

For every Tommy story I have, MBW has ten. She’s home with both boys during the summer when school is out. Virtually every evening when I come home from work I hear the latest chapter in The Saga of Tommy.

Chapter 12 – Tommy hit and pinched Chris for no reason.

Chapter 19 – Tommy dumped the Ant Farm on the floor “just to see what would happen.”

Chapter 31 – Tommy knocked over Chris’ tower of blocks, then threw one of the blocks and hit Chris in the head. For fun.

Chapter 44 – He hit MBW and, when she packed him off to sit on his bed, called her “stupid.”

Chapter 60 – Tommy pulled all the leaves off one of the houseplants and threw them all over the living room like confetti.

There are more. You get the idea.

This past weekend we had dinner on our back deck. It’s a lovely place to sit in the evening with a cool breeze blowing. Perhaps because it feels more relaxed and casual, Tommy decides he can lean backing his chair, put his feet on the table, and eat his dinner with his fingers.

“Tommy, get your feet off the able and sit up straight, please,” I said.

He looks at me, smiles, does nothing.

“Tommy, do the right thing.”

A bigger smile.

“Tommy, take your feet off the table or you’re going to your room!”

A grin like you wouldn’t believe.

It isn’t until I start to push back from the table that he quickly lowers his legs and sits up straight, all the while with a twinkle in his eyes.

He’s won again.

The other night MBW and I were talking about him. “He’s driving me crazy,” she says. “I’m at my wit’s end. I don’t know what to do!”

I nod my head seriously, agree with her, maintain a very earnest and frank expression on my face. Acknowledge that is it very frustrating. Promise to consider different ways to reign in this wild behavior. Assure her that I’m with her, that we are a united front against the Disruptive Force that is Tommy.

With MBW safely in bed, my own smile creeps across my face.

Because, honestly, I admire the kid.

I love his spunk, his attitude, his willingness to be his own person. While any given individual expression of this personality may be inappropriate, and while we do need to provide rules and structure for his behavior, I refuse to try to crush the independent, maverick spirit he seems to have.

Chris is in the 95% for height among kids his age. He’s got wonderful motor skills. He can run, throw, hit a ball like nobody’s business. Tommy, on the other hand, is in the 23% for height among kids his age. He’s underweight, plus he has asthma. He’s had far more medical issues in his young life than Chris ever had.

But what he lacks right now in physical stature or stamina, he more than makes up in attitude. He is fierce. He won’t back down. He may lose, but he’s never beaten. He’ll go toe-to-toe with Chris, and often get the best of him. And while I don’t condone fighting between the two of them by any means, it does happen, and it’s interesting to me to see how when I get there to break things up it is, more often than not, Tommy who’s gotten the best of it.

I said at the beginning of this post that Chris is more like me. The truth is I wish I had some of Tommy in me. So I’m not going to try to take it out of him.

The world needs people like me. Ordinary men, doing the right thing. Chris, it appears, is on that path. Get an education, get a job, pay your taxes, raise your family, be a productive, contributing member of society.

The world needs mavericks, too. Risk takers. Individuals unafraid to be who they are, go their own way, march to the drummer only they can hear. Maybe Tommy will be one of those men.

He’s certainly one of those boys right now.

Will I work to provide boundaries, set expectations, enforce consequences for him? Absolutely.

Will I crush his spirit, make him conform, break his will? No way in hell.

Maybe we should all spend a day, now and then, in the Tommy Standard Time zone.

It sounds like fun to me!

It’s great to be The Family Man.