With good reason

I have no scintillating prose today, nor even poetry. But I have a good reason, which is almost as good. It is:

Douwe is sick. Daan is not yet but about to be getting sick. And I am tired.

Don't worry, I expect it is just a cold -- snotty noses, coughs, and general malaise -- the Wild Boys spent their day alternating between watching DVDs in a trancelike state with little glassy eyes and being whiny and clingy and otherwise impossibly miserable with little glassy eyes.

Douwe decided to fight taking his medicine before bed (apparently preferring a spiking fever to grape flavor motrin) so I got to pour it in his mouth and hold his mouth closed. I haven't had to do that in two years, I think. Of course, I have been using chewables for two years, too. But I am out of them and they don't have kids chewables here or so I hear.

I hate doing that. I dislike myself after doing that. What kind of jerk holds a feverish 5 year old down, pours slimy stuff in his mouth, and then holds his mouth shut? And what kind of really big jerk says, when he spits it all back out, "Then we are going to do it again and again until you swallow your medicine"? Then does it again?

After two rounds of his best Mt. St. Helens imitation he decided I really meant it this time and sat up straight and drank it himself, sort of hiccuping and weeping all the way. Then said "See, Mama, that was clever of Douwe,". Which somehow made me feel worse.

Somebody remind me to put Motrin Chewables (grape) on my shopping list in May, would you? If I have to hold Daan down tomorrow I think my hands will shake right off. In the kitchen, afterwards, that is.