This song was born one Saturday morning, about twenty years ago when my son, Collin, was still in kindergarten. As I was walking through the living room, probably in the middle of weekend chores, I passed Collin and his friend Joey, huddled at our family computer. They were playing Power Pete, a game that came pre-loaded on the Mac. I think it was similar to Super Mario. Players had to navigate a kind of maze while gobbling various objects in order to accumulate points and advance to the next level. Our kids loved it! This was a pre-mouse Mac, so Lara (five years older than Collin) would operate the arrow keys to navigate while Collin's only job was to shoot ... over and over and over. Did I say they loved it? In a recent trip to Chicago, they both became filled with nostalgic glee when someone found a Power Pete video on YouTube.

On this particular Saturday, one of Collin's classmates had slept over and the two were intent on Power Pete in their pajamas. They had juice glasses at their sides and what looked like the remains of peanut butter toast or whatever Diane had fixed for them on kid-friendly plastic plates. It looked like a kinder-office. Today, I guess, you'd call them gamers. The only sounds in the room were the click, click, click of the keyboard, and the constant chatter between them. As I walked past, I happened to hear Joey say that his favorite artist was Vincent Van Gogh, while Collin offered that he preferred Pablo Picasso. It stopped me in my tracks. It was not the kind of chatter that I had grown used to hearing from these two. I would have expected something about Batman or Godzilla. No doubt their art teacher had been introducing them to various styles of art and, wonder of wonders, they liked it. And why wouldn't they? Van Gogh had that great explosion of colors leaping off the canvas. And Picasso, well, who can even say what was going on in his head? And what child wouldn't want to paint like someone who didn't seem to follow any rules at all. It would not be the first time that my son would surprise me.

Their conversation stuck with me for a long, long time, until some months later, I wrote this song, a kind of celebration of childhood and parenthood all rolled into one. We all wanted our children to meet the world head on with joy and wonder, even as we ran along beside them trying to be nurturing and supportive, but not too nurturing and supportive, just the right amount. It was at once exhilarating and exhausting. Remember the first time you took your toddler to the park, and she went back and forth between the swing, slide and teeter-totter, and after five minutes you felt like you'd been there for an hour? Remember the time you and your son were both home sick with the flu, and in your feverish state, grandma showed up with six hours of newly recorded Barney videos? Maybe that was just me.

Raising children was like time traveling. You immediately had a new appreciation for your parents. You saw them, maybe for the first time, as not simply parents, but people with hopes and dreams that maybe hadn't always involved carting your ass all over town. And then you looked at your kids, and you remembered some of the same reactions and feelings that you witnessed in them. Of course, you wanted them to benefit from your knowledge and experience. You didn't want them to suffer as you had suffered, even though, let's face it, some of that was out of your hands. Even when they were listening, they weren't really listening. But they were so joyous as toddlers, so filled with possibility, and so darned cute. We were forever grateful, but we really wanted to take a nap. 

Pablo & Vincent

Pablo Picasso and Vincent Van Gogh were playing

Power Pete in the den

Pablo did things no other painter could do

He made it to level 2 of the game

 

Batman and Robin painted windmills in fields

With swirling leaves and stars up above

But Mr. Freeze drew frozen pictures of ice

He wasn’t evil, just chilled to the bone

 

Action figures and magic markers

Concerts sung in the bath

Dried out paint sets and bedroom sword fights

Make us mad, make us laugh

 

Where do babies come from?

Where do dead people go?

What happens when you go outside without shoes?

You get a sliver inside your thumb toe

 

Sit up straight at the table

Brush your teeth before bed

Don’t leave your music on the living room floor

‘Cause you can’t keep all those notes in your head

 

Hats and mittens and soggy snow pants

Summer days at the pool

Can’t see how lucky we are to have them

Can’t wait ‘til they go to school

 

Babies don’t always smell good

Grown-ups don’t always know best

Naps are something you never outgrow

If you can have on then you’re truly blessed.