The Golden Nugget
At the end of my last entry in the Thorn Birds-length epic that has become the Internet’s definitive chronicle of potty-training, my three-year-old son Elijah had successfully pissed into his plastic mini-toilet, which is shaped like a throne and makes a trumpet sound every time liquid or solid material passes its high-tech sensors. We crossed a Rubicon of piss that morning, never to turn back. The next day, Sunday, began way too early.
It was my turn to get up with the kid. The previous three mornings, Elijah had woken anywhere between 7:15 and 8:00. That time-range is still well in advance of my preferred 10:30 AM rising, but it’s certainly sane. I try to make it a policy to never get out of bed until Katie Couric has been at work for at least three hours.
At 4:30 AM, Elijah began to complain that he was “cold” and “scared” and also that he wanted “orange juice.” My sensitive response, as I lay in the next room beside my wife was as follows:
“Goddamn it! It’s 4:30 in the fucking morning! What the fuck is his problem?”
His problem was that his favorite TV shows all air before sunrise. As soon as he opens his eyes, he wants to watch them. After much reluctance and grousing, plus my weekly conversation with Regina where she exhaustedly tells me how much she resents me for not wanting to get up with Elijah in the morning, I rose.
I fetched Elijah an orange juice and a tasty morning snack assortment, turned on the TV, lay down on the sofa, and covered myself with a blanket. For the next 80 minutes, I dozed intermittently through the various high-pitched squealy sounds that comprise my son’s crappy programs. Dora The Explorer became Higglytown Heroes became Little Einsteins. All the shows involved blinking wide-eyed cartoon kids on moronic missions: They had to bring a hot-dog vendor his lucky ketchup bottle. They had to bring a magic flute to a goody-goody Peruvian boy so his music could make the crops grow. They had to rescue a tomboy’s birthday balloons, which had inexplicably floated into the rainforest. Thank god they had a magic rocketship! Or a sassy monkey sidekick! Or a loveable fussbudget squirrel friend! Man, I hate these shows. Sometimes, I want to say, damn it, I don’t care if Swiper The Fox stole your chocolate boat. Shut the fuck up, Dora.
I opened my raw-red eyes, saw that Elijah had eaten an entire tangerine and several pieces of wheat-bran cereal, and sensed an opportunity.
“Do you want to go to the potty?” I said.
“Yeah,” he said.
I took the little prince into the bathroom, sat him on his throne, and handed him Tick-Tock Sharks.
“Read this,” I said.
He did, and then he told me he wanted another book, “one about animals.” I went into the living room and found a How And Why Wonder Book, previously from Regina’s brother’s childhood in the early 70s. It’s somehow survived to the present day and is one of Elijah’s favorites. I handed it to him.
“Could you go now, daddy? And close the door. I want to be alone.”
Oh ho. This was a good sign. I immediately shut him into the WC and went outside with a bag of trash. When I returned, I heard this:
“I pooped, daddy! I pooped! I did it in the potty! A big poop!”
Was that the throne I heard, or Gabriel’s trumpet? Wonder of wonder, miracle of miracles! I ran to the bathroom.
In the bottom of the throne lay a turd to make daddy proud. It was bright orange long, and thick, a Nerf poo. Elijah had eaten a lot of carrots the day before. But other than the color, it looked like a crap that I could have taken. How in the world, I wondered, does Elijah tolerate having something like that in his pants three times a day?
Since I got married in the spring of 2000, the world has pretty much gone to hell, though not, I might add, because I got married. I’ve conducted my family-man business in a climate of war, fear, terrorism, economic uncertainty, and a complete evaporation of civic discourse, not to mention massive flooding exacerbated by governmental incompetence. It’s hard to be a responsible citizen when your society is a parody of itself. But when I bore witness to my son’s bright-orange play-toilet turd on that Sunday morning, I had to consider my life a success, and the world a happy place. No amount of exclamation points could express my glee.
“I am so proud of you!” I said. “I’ve never been more proud of you! That’s amazing! You are an amazing, incredible boy!”
“I’m an amazing pooper!” he said.
“Yes you are!”
“Can I have ice cream now?”
“Of course you can! Oh, son! This is the greatest thing you’ve ever done!”
“Yes!” he said. “It is!”
I looked at him, eyes a-glint. Time to make Regina resent me a little more. I said,
“Let’s go wake up mommy and tell her.”