Pouting and Sulking

Those who have children will remember the days when you sneaked off with the spouse leaving behind cribs and diapers for a day or so of respite. This being the Saturday before my birthday my dear hubby had planned a nice day for just the two of us and our dear son had Grandpa sitting duty.

Rising early we dressed and were out the door by 7:30, long before anyone else was up. After an early breakfast we made our way to an old locomotive train station. What fun! My husband had planned a whole day of travel through the hill country to the little town of Burnett, and best of all ... just for the two of us. After a couple of hours of train travel we arrived at our destination, enjoyed two more hours of antique shopping, some good eats and then boarded for the two hours back. All considered, this made for a full day bringing us back home around 5:00 P.m.

Walking in the front door I found my dad sitting in one of his favorite overstuffed chairs. No, "hello, I missed you." No, "how was your day?" Not even an acknowledgment of our presence in the house. Just silence, his chin resting in his hands a sorrowful, woe is me look on his face. With an obvious chill in the air, Pop was pouting and sulking.

Ordinarily if I found him in such low spirits I would inquire. But this time it was totally obvious to me what the problem was. I had even sort of anticipated this lack of welcome before I got home. You see, I had committed the unpardonable. I had been gone ALL DAY LONG.

I have also learned from experience that the best solution to these displays of attitude is to give a casual explanation as to why we were gone and follow it up with a little distraction, perhaps a ride in the car to run an errand, minus the car seat, of course. Soon I hear, "Is there anything I can do to help?" Everything is cool again.