First Names

We were visiting Mom and Del for the weekend. It would be a quick trip since the bride and I had to be back to work on Tuesday.

It was spur of the moment trip so it was a nice surprise that we were able to bring Kyle along with us. He was living with his mother and going to pre-school and I was fearful that our weekend trip might interfere with his class schedule.

Kyle was having a grand time playing with an old stool with a cotton-filled cushion on top of it and an old broom handle. Grandpa Del had given him permission to beat on the stool with the long piece of wood.

Kyle had never been what one would call a talker and seemed to play well by himself. As he whacked the stool over and over, Mom, Del, Mary and I chewed the fat.

For whatever reason, I called Kyle over saying, “Come here.”

I told him to tell Grandma Margie his name.

Much to my astonishment and Mom’s displeasure, he looked her straight in the face and said, “Come here.”

It was time I started to remember to preface my request with his first name from then on.