The boys are a little over a year and a half now. I had heard horror stories of the terrible two's and like most parents broke into a cold sweat at the mere mention of them but figured that I had a grace period before my two started their quest for independence. Monkey Boy decided to establish his individuality by not sticking to the timetable and choosing "No" as the first word that he says with any clarity. In fact he can say it in a variety if different ways. In his arsenal he has the plain "no", he has the firmer "NO" and when the occasion requires it he can produce either a "NNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!" or a "NNNOOO NNOOOOO NNOOOOO NNOOOOO!!!" from his repertoire. His range extends from primal rage to despairing heartbreak.
We get to hear a recital from Monkey Boy almost every day when we get home. We live in a house with a communal green area out front in an area where there are lots of young children playing on any given evening. As soon as they set eyes on the other kids they want to join in the fun but they are too young and we are much happier to let them loose in the back garden where we there are no passing cars. As soon as it becomes clear that we aren’t going to let them go and play with the traffic the howls begin. I know that even though they don’t have many words, they understand what we are saying most of the time but regardless of our assurances that they can play in the back garden, there is no consoling them. So every day for the summer you will be able to see myself and my wife jog through the house with a pair of screaming babies. I’m always amused by the way that, although seemingly overcome with grief, they can stop the tears as soon as the back door opens and toddle along as if nothing had happened.
This quest for independence and freedom leads me to one of my favourite twin anecdotes to date. Our house was built relatively recently and meets all the accessibility regulations meaning that the door handles are low and the boys could reach them from a young age. The saving grace was that the front and back door handles were slightly higher so apart from the risk of fingers being caught in a door we could keep the boys contained. On a Tuesday night while Hannah was out I caught Fat Chops trying to reach the front door handle. He couldn't quite make it so I took a picture on my phone and sent it to Hannah saying we didn't have long left before they could get out [hindsight is funny!].
The following night, I was tidying up in the kitchen and Hannah was cutting the grass in the back garden while the boys pottered around the house. I heard a door slam and thought to myself "that doesn't sound like one of the internal doors" but didn't get overly concerned. [It’s very common for them to slam doors and as long as it’s not followed by the screams of a toddler with crushed fingers, I can live with it.] I stuck my head into the hall only to see FC in the same position as the previous evening, on his toes, stretching for the handle. Before I could look around for his brother he stretched a tiny bit further and opened the door. I walked down to him chuckling to myself that I had even less time than I had thought when I had texted that picture. I picked him up I looked up and saw his brother smiling at me - from the middle of the road! I mentioned earlier that there are a lot of children in the estate so most people know to drive carefully but that didn’t sink in until after I had a small panic attack.
As for Monkey Boy, he just kept grinning as if to say "Free at last!!!"
P.S. Thanks to Ronan for the tip!
P.P.S. Please leave some comments, preferably telling me how witty I am but constructive criticism would be great.
P.P.P.S. Don't forget that I'm trying to make my millions out of this so that I can give up the day job. Tell your friends!!
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