Sky Blue Splurge

There are times in our lives that we do things against our better judgment. We know full well going into them that we shouldn’t and that there will be consequences to pay afterwards, and yet we do them anyways. We eat an entire tube of store-bought Nestle cookie dough in one sitting. We spend way too much at the store because there’s a sale that we just can’t pass up. We watch a scary movie before bed…..And almost immediately, we regret our decision. Our stomachs ache from the sugar overload. We drive home afraid to tell our husbands how much we spent. We can’t fall asleep because bloody horror scenes keep flashing under our half-closed eyelids. If I had to put a name to this type of activity, I would call it a splurge.  It’s an act of extreme indulgence. Unfortunately, such immediate gratification almost always comes with a price.

Yesterday’s household activity would most definitely be classified under this category. For some reason or another I decided to let Josie and Jamie help me paint the upstairs bathroom. I’m not even going to attempt to explain how I came to make this choice because, as is true with all splurges, my decision making process was comprised of a long strain of meaningless justifications and very little well formulated reasoning. Before I knew it my 4 year old and 2 year old were up to their elbows in sky blue wall paint with smiles that stretched from ear to ear, and once my better judgment had kicked in there was no going back. Thankfully, I was thinking clear enough to strip both the kids of their clothes. There’s nothing wrong with an occasional lapse in judgment, but soiling perfectly cute Gymboree outfits is completely unacceptable. Every moment of the activity was supervised. I took turns showing each of the kids how to use the paintbrush and the roller and as soon as I took my eyes off one, the other would dribble paint across the floor or fling it on the walls.

Every time Josie splattered paint in an inappropriate place she would look at me with her big dark brown eyes and say, “Sorry Mommy.” But her face said more. It was saying, “I’m so sorry, Mommy. Please don’t take my paintbrush away. I’ll be more careful.” I just smiled and said, “It’s okay,” and reached for the paper towels. Then she would resume her energetic strokes. 

 Jamie in particular had very little understanding of the properties of wet paint. He bumped just about every surface of his naked body against the wall. By the end, his hair, his lips, his hands, his feet, his belly, both his butt cheeks, and even the tip of his little penis were a beautiful sky blue. (I realize that if he ever reads this when he is older he is going to be mortified, which makes writing it all the funnier).  

Every portion of the wall that the kids painted had to be repainted later, in order to flatten the thick, globby brushstrokes. Very little progress was made.

By the end, the kids were covered in paint that had to be scrubbed so hard before it came off that it left their skin raw, and even then we didn’t get it all. The bathroom floor, the bath tub, the toilet, and the sink are still speckled with paint and it will probably take me more time to scrape it off than it did to paint the walls.

But for a while it was really fun. I think the kids knew how special it was for mommy to have actually agreed to let them help. They were giggling with excitement. Maybe it was because the paint fumes were short circuiting my brain cells, but there were a couple minutes when I forgot about all the other problems facing me in the outside world and was able to just enjoy my little happy family, all crammed together in a sky blue bathroom. I love eating a tube of cookie dough as much as anyone, but letting my kids paint with me…now, that’s a splurge worth paying the consequences for!