Holy Antique Chairs, Batman

As I was sitting at the computer a few nights ago, my 2-year-old daughter was doodling on a sheet of looseleaf paper with a pencil. What better way to stimulate her little mind, I thought. Maybe she will be the next Picasso, Shakespeare, or Erma Bombeck...

I had given my wife a "free pass" to go out and meet her parents to go shopping, since they were in town from Florida. "What the heck?"...I figured. Nothing ever goes wrong on Daddy's watch, right?

I heard a tapping sound coming from the next room so I asked my daughter what she was doing.

"Making holes in the paper", she said casually.

Ah, perhaps a nice connect-the-dots puzzle, I told myself. After about 20 minutes of this, I decided to check on her progress.

To my amazement, my daughter had indeed been making holes in the sheet of paper. This would have been a very cute activity had she not been doing so on top of my wife's grandparents' antique leather chair, which now also had about two dozen or so holes punched through its seat cushion.

My first reaction was very 'Incredible Hulk'-like. I could feel my shirt ripping right where my love handles were poking through the sides. Then I had a flashback to one Christmas when, as a little boy, my father let ME put the 'tree-topper' on our family Christmas tree. This topper was an antique, glass ornament that had belonged to my grandmother. Having been given this honorable task, I was lifted up by my father, and I proceeded to drop the thing about 6 feet down onto our living room floor where it shattered into a million pieces.

My father's reaction was very calm. Sort of a "that's ok, son...no big deal" thing which totally shocked me. He later told me that he was pretty torn up about it but he didn't want me to feel bad so he let it go.

I, therefore, looked at my daughter, took her by the hand and said,

"Come on, let's go draw on the kitchen table, not on Mommy's favorite chair."

Later that evening, after the kids were in bed and my wife came home, I had the pleasure of telling her what had happened on my shift. I guess her dad never let her put an ornament on top of their tree.