Pee in the Trashcan and All Those Questions

I just needed to make a quick trip to Walmart.  Both Levi and Adelaide were happy and well behaved, but Adelaide and Mommy were both starting to get a little tired.  I was pushing us all to get this one last errand finished.  Well, except the actual last errand of returning our library books.   I was focused, weaving around endcaps and through stands full of children's clothing, picking up speed when I hit the main aisle to the other side of the store for my stain-remover spray.  I hadn't bothered to write my list, because it was short, but keeping one's mind on task is challenging when a small person of the precocious variety is skipping all around you, demanding answers to rapid-fire questions.

Some of them are annoyingly simple.

"Levi, you know why people wear hats in the winter." 

Some of them are annoyingly hard.

"Uuuuuum, well, we'll have to look up squids on the computer when we get home to find that out, Snug."

It is fascinating to me how alive to the world Levi is.  A four-year-old has aptly conquered some of the basics of life and is suddenly mentally able to do a touch of critical thinking and piecing together that astounds me to watch.  It is a thrill.  It makes me so proud.  It makes me newly appreciative of the simple intricacies of everyday life.  And sometimes, it would try to drive me to madness.  All this assimilating is highly dependent on Mommy being always at the ready (and I mean always) like some submissive, professorial old man with a beard and glasses following behind the kid in an intimidated cower and providing quick solutions to every new conundrum.

"Mommy, can I get an orange soda?" he interrupted one question with this new one when he spotted the cooler at the checkout.  Normally, it's just one more question in the barrell, receiving the expected "no."  But today:

"Sure!"  I said, knowing it was not the best use of money, a terrible habit to start, and more sugar than was quite right, but that I was fully intent on getting a Coke for myself.  I opened the cooler door, grabbed my Coke, and looked down at Levi, waiting for him to get his Sunkist.  

"What's in that bottle?"  He was pointing at a Mello Yello.

"It's like Spr---"

"What's that?" pointing at something new.

"Which one--?"

"Oh, I want this one!" pointing at Coke Zero (I was opening my mouth to speak...) "No, this one!" (this time pointing at the Dr. Pepper)

We'd been standing there with the door gaping, letting aaaall the cold out and getting looks from Vermonty hippies who couldn't decide if they hated me more for ruining the earth with that open door or for putting poison into my little angel in the form of high fructose corn syrup.

"No, those have caffeine, son, and we have to close this door.  You can get Sprite or Sunkist.  What's it gonna be?"

"Can I get this one?"  He was pointing again at the Mello Yello.  I guarantee you that though I didn't finish the word "Sprite" when he asked me about the Mello Yello before, he processed the connection still the same. 

"Yep, it's like Sprite; grab it, son."

"Is it like Sprite?" 

"Yes, it's lemony like Sprite. Closing this door now..."

Grabbing it, "Mmm, yum, I like Sprite!"

He's king of the Repeat You Question: 
"Levi, I'm going to go put Adelaide down."
"Are you going to put Adelaide down?"
(Sigh. Really?)

-OR-

"Levi, look!  That's a beaver dam!"
"Is that a beaver dam?"

But I digress.

So, we hustled through the checkout, maneuvered through the cold wind to the car, got everyone situated (Levi was talking the whole time, and as is custom, I just shut his door after strapping him into his seat.  He doesn't care, and I have the slight, awful satisfaction of just slamming a door in his face), gave Levi his drink, took a deep breath (as, surely, he would be silent to drink his drink for at least one whole minute), when...

"Is this drink like Sprite?" 
(Are you kidding me?)
"Yep, it's lemony like Sprite, baby.  Try it.  It's called Mello Yello."
"What?!"
"Mello Yello."
"Mello Yello?"
"Uh-huh."
"Why is it called Mello Yello?"
"Son, I don't know."  (Relaxing my shoulders)  "Probably because it's kind of yellow, and it's lemony."
"IS it called Mello Yello?"
"Yes."
Finishing his first drink, "Mmmm!  Yep, it IS Sprite!"
"Noooooo, it's Mello Yello.  It tastes like Sprite."  Now I was the one getting persnickity about details, but we'd started down this road, and the teacher-mom in me who values listening skills was not about to let this go without us all having a thorough working knowledge of Mello Yello and its relationship to Sprite.

All day, every day, folks!  We have these types of conversations one after the other on various and sundry topics of interest and no interest at all.  The thing is, Levi needs repetition right now.  Repetition is how this age group typically processes.  It is constant, though, so I've learned this:  If I need quiet to concentrate on a task at hand, and the professorial old man needs to vacate for a bit, I just tell Levi flat-out, "No questions, dude.  Mama's gotta think!"

When we got home, I had to go to the bathroom so badly, as is typical.  (There is a point to that odd confession, I promise.)  I rushed through the front door, clunked Adelaide's carseat down on the floor, and hustled into the bathroom, only to realize too late that there was pee all over the toilet, and now, all over me.  Levi.  Then, I noticed something odd about the little trash can on the floor.  This one hadn't been emptied in months, because we so rarely use it.  Until now.  It had finally gotten full enough to go out in Monday's trash and now sat with no trash in it.  Apparently, the clean canvas must have been too much for my creative little monkey to resist, because there was a puddle of pee at the bottom.  Lovely.

I never in a million years would've fathomed that I, one who enjoys solitude at regular intervals, would live with a person who harassed me with questions all. day. long. and who peed all over the bathroom.  And in the trashcan.  But here we are!  And it turns out that he is the coolest little man on the planet.  The conversations we have are some of the best, even when they're reminders that we may not(!!) pee all over the place and must, in fact, only aim for the toilet water. 

"For the toilet water?"
"Yes, Levi, just the toilet water..."