Honey milk

"Honey milk. I want honey milk."
"You want honey milk what?"
"Now?"
Sigh.
"What's the magic word?"
"Abracadabra?"
"..."
"Please can I have some honey milk?"
"That's so much nicer. I will make you some honey milk."

The funny thing is, I thought I had invented honey milk, to placate the boy with something sweet and warm and milky that didn't emanate directly from me. It's not something I remember from my childhood, like mashed bananas, or French toast, or a big bowl of Bird's custard. Then I heard that my sister-in-law makes it for my nephews too. I suppose it's pretty obvious, but I wondered if it was some sort of biological knowledge all mothers carry deep in our genes.

We just had friends staying with us. Their son is two months younger than Monkey, and the boys spent the time beating each other up, chasing each other maniacally around the house and over the sofa, wailing for justice because one or other had inflicted a completely unexpected injury, or sitting quietly side by side on the sofa, mesmerised by the swift and judicious application of a Batman DVD by exasperated parents. It was a little tiring. I love having guests, but much like Douglas Adams - who loved to hear the whoosh of deadlines as they went past - I also love the restoration of silence and order when they leave, even though we still have two perfectly noisy and messy children of our own. There's nothing like some variety to make you appreciate the normal.

Almost a week ago, in a fit of productiveness, I strode purposefully towards a shelf to tidy something and smashed my toe forcefully into a chair leg on the way. As I hopped around gasping in agony and trying (as I do sometimes at moments like this) to gauge how much like or unlike the pain of labour and childbirth it was, I cast around in vain for someone else to blame. My children, for callously watching TV as I writhed? My husband for misaligning the chair leg? (It wasn't misaligned.) Sadly, only myself, for not paying attention and/or wearing shoes. But I never wear shoes in the house - I've never broken a toe before. It's not actually broken - Dr Google convinced me that it would be purple all over instead of just one place if that were the case, and I wouldn't be able to walk at all. It's improving slowly, but I've been limping, more or less depending on the recent-ness of follow-up injuries like Monkey jumping on my bare foot in his sandals, or bumping the same toe into the table leg as I stood up (will I never learn? no, apparently) ever since.

My little toes are ridiculous bumps of things, mere carbuncles on the rest of my peculiar little short, wide, high-arched, stumpy-toed feet, with no visible joints to them, just a curve leading leading to the tiniest toenail you've ever seen. On the rare occassions that I go for a pedicure, I always expect the girl to burst out laughing and ask me if I seriously expect her to put polish on that tiny expanse. Possibly she tells all her friends in Korean and all the other salon girls are surreptitiously mocking my tiny pinkie toes as they pass. But they're polite enough not to say anything directly to me, for which I must be grateful.

So here I am, languishing with my bruised foot up, guests gone, house a disaster - but I have no impetus left to clean it, so it can stay that way for a while - Monkey sporting his new, improved (because it actually fits him this time) Spider-Man costume. I like to think that he's less obsessive about it than he would have been if he'd got it, say, this time last year, which was probably about when he started to want one. I can actually get him out of the house in regular clothes still, which is a plus, even if he did leave the swimming-pool changing rooms all Spidey'd up the other day. He now wants us to make him red gloves out of cardboard, no matter how often we explain that cardboard just doesn't sew. He's not a child to take no for an answer; he just asks again. And again. And again, while I'm making dinner. And again, at bedtime. And again, first thing in the morning.

I have no idea where he gets such optimism from.

Obsessions

I may not have mentioned this, but we have a full-blown Spider-Man obsession going on over here. I think this is what three-year-old boys do. When he was two, he quite liked trains, but never developed the mania for wheeled objects, or construction vehicles, or farm animals that some toddlers get. Then, at two and three-quarters, he became obsessed with The Little Mermaid, which we had got for Christmas. Heavily invested. We all took on roles: I was Ariel, the baby was Flounder, Monkey himself was Prince Eric (of course), and most hilariously, B was known as Yucky Octopus, Monkey's name for Ursula the Sea Witch, the villain of the piece. I got quite used to answering to Ariel on the playground, but the culmination was when our Valentine's Day card came back from school dutifully transcribed with the loving message: "To Ariel and Yucky Octopus, love from Prince Eric." The teachers weren't quite sure how we'd take that.

It wore off, I went back to being Mummy some time before the summer, and he decided to call B by his first name instead of Daddy (we're still waiting for that phase to end). But Mermaidgate was quickly replaced by Spider-Man-itis. It all began, I think, with the underpants. In my enthusiasm to toilet train, I bought whatever nasty character-laden underpants excited Monkey's desires. We have Thomas the Tank Engine, Spongebob, Cars, and two sets of Spider-Man. (And some nice plain shorts-style ones that have been rejected out of hand.) This coincided with B finding a small Spidey action figure when out running one day. And then there was a t-shirt on the sale rack in Target, and as a special treat when we were in Germany the belt from H&M ... and thus the costume began to take shape.

Nowadays, full regalia consists of Spider-Man underpants, Spider-Man t-shirt, red long-sleeved top, blue jeans, Spider-Man belt, red-and-blue socks, blue stripey gloves, Spider-Man hat (suddenly H&M is all Spidey-ed up, as if it's not just my kid or something), mask (we caved and got him a mask and web shooter toy thingy after he didn't get to be Spider-Man for halloween), and Spider-Man watch (from Santa). At the moment he keeps his Spider-Man kit - hat, mask, gloves, cape (non-canon, and a bit risky considering what Edna Mode says about capes in The Incredibles) and zoo pen (um?) - in a clear plastic package with a zip that contained fridge-magnet letters or some such. This goes everywhere with Monkey, so that he can transform into Spider-Man at the drop of a hat/tall building. Depending on his mood, it can be very difficult to get him to dress in anything that's not red and/or blue, and the nice brown cords I got for this winter have gone totally unworn.

Until now, any time Monkey has put marker to paper, we've always ended up with an impatient scrawl, a (probably black) swirl of nothing, like as not going through the paper with the force of frustration. But the other day something great happened: he sat down with a piece of paper, took a little time, and found that he could make the pen do what he wanted. And lo, a picture formed, of a blue-and-red man with something extending from each hand...the amazing, astounding, mesmerising, all-powerful Spider-Man.



He is, in fact, going to get a Spider-Man costume for his birthday in April. It arrived the other day, though I haven't actually taken it out of the package yet. I think it's warranted; it's certainly been more than a passing fad. And if he wants to wear it out and about every day, I hope I can let him do that, at least for a while. But I have no illusions that he'll stop pulling out all my red and blue towels and piling them in the middle of the floor with his blue duvet cover and every other red and blue item he can find in the house in order to create the ultimate machine that will turn him into the real deal: Spider-Man in both looks and deeds. I just keep telling him that with great power comes great responsibility.