Riding in a Car with an Obstinate Preschooler, Ad Nauseum

A few days ago, Joel and I had an errand we needed to run which involved a thirty-minute drive to the nearest city. The kids were happy to tag along and were pretty good. On the ride home, though, Mr. Tired-and-cranky Everett decided that the world was his enemy. Want to know how we figured that one out? Read on.

Everett, after finding out that he was not going to get out of the car as soon as he pleased, looked down at his navy blue athletic shorts (the ones he had painstakingly selected to match his navy blue shirt) and scowled.

"I not like this stripe, Mommy. I not like the red and white stripe. I not want these shorts. I want my other shorts, my shorts like Jack's."

"Everett," I said with a laugh, "Are we home?"

"No."

"Well, then we can't get your other shorts, can we?"

Everett's scowl quickly ballooned into outright frustration.

"I want to go to our new home NOW!"

"Everett, we're going as fast as we can. You just have to wait."

"I WANT TO GO NOOOWWWW!" Everett's yells pierced our ears and tested our patience.

"Well, we can't."

Everett stuck his chin out and looked out the window, his bright red ears clearly displaying his growing anger.

"Well, I want to go to that white house right there!" Everett pointed to a warehouse of some sort that was situated far out in a field.

"Everett, that's not a house."

"Ye-es, it is."

"Everett, I promise it isn't."

"YES, it IS!!!"

I rolled my eyes.

"Why is it not a house?" Everett asked willfully.

"Because. It is for things, not people." My answer wasn't very specific but Everett was temporarily mollified.

As Everett took in more of his surroundings, we passed a bunch of fields filled with tall, waving grass.

"I want to bring some grass in the car so I can throw it up and make it be snowing." Everett gets the funniest ideas sometimes.

"Sorry, Everett,"I said, knowing I was only feeding into the next explosion, "we can't get any grass right now."

"I want it to be snowing NOW!!!!"

"Well, sorry. It can't be snowing now."

"Whyyyyyyy?"

"It's summer. It doesn't snow in the summer."

"I NOT WANT IT TO BE SUMMER!" Everett just couldn't get any satisfactory answers out of us, no matter how hard he tried.

Joel and I sighed and ignored him.

Everett glared at us and said spitefully, "I want to play in the snow NOW, ALL BY MYSELF!"

Joel and I snickered to each other.

"Everett, that is impossible." Joel's voice glinted with amusement.

"No, Papa, it not impossible," Everett argued back stubbornly.

"Yes it is." Sometimes Joel just doesn't know when to quit.

"No, it isn't! It not IMPOSSIBLE. PAPA! It NOT IMPOSSIBLE!" Everett's yells reverberated and magnified around our car's interior, and made our ears ring in protestation.

Everett's clumsy anger was pretty funny, so of course we did the rational thing: we laughed. We laughed pretty hard. And with each laugh, Everett turned a deeper shade of red and his face scrunched up more intensely.

Poor Everett. He was fighting hard, but it was too late now that Joel had found a good way to keep him riled.

"NO! Stop that, PAPA! STOP THAT!"

"Hah, hah, hah." Joel's laughs were fake but no less infuriating to this particular three-year-old. "Hah Hah Hah!"

"PAPAAAAAA!" STOOOOOP THAAAAAAT NOOOOW!" Everett was about to burst, I think. At least I was pretty sure there was no possible way he could be yelling any louder.

"Stop that!" Ashley yelled happily from her car seat, wanting to join in on the fun but missing the punchline.

Everett must have given up, because the next few minutes passed with a stony silence flowing from Everett's direction and a pleasant silence issuing from ours. Yes, we eventually got home and yes, he got to wear his favored "shorts like Jack's." But no matter how hard he tried and how much he wished it, Everett still could not get it to snow.