Heat Ducts

I was downstairs the other day getting dinner ready. Both of my kids were upstairs. Suddenly, I hear this crying...but it's the type of crying where it was loud and frenzied. I knew something was wrong and before I headed up, my kids were already heading down to the kitchen.

My eldest was bawling her little eyes out. And she could barely eek a word out and had that heavy breathing. She was doing the ugly cry thing that Oprah talks about.

What ended up happening was that my eldest was playing with her sister and they had one of those arts and crafts jewels. Basically, it's worthless...but as an arts and crafts project, it's awesome! And the one yellow jewel she was holding fell down the heat duct because she wasn't holding onto it carefully. Now, isn't it usually the younger kid that cries their little eyes out because the big sister lost the toy? Nope, not in this household.

My eldest was crying her eyes out because she was so remorseful and so mad at herself for having dropped the jewel down the heat duct. Her dad came home and tried to get it out of the heat duct. She asked where the jewel goes, then what happens to it. My husband was patient in explaining it all to her. And honestly, by this time, my youngest was happily doing other things. She basically couldn't care less about the damn jewel that was lost. But no, my eldest would suddenly burst into tears over this thing. Well, we finally ended the night and she seemed ok.

The next morning, she came downstairs and she had the ugly cry going on again. She remembered the jewel. Then she started to go around the whole house closing all the ducts because she didn't want anything else to fall down any of the ducts. During the rest of the day, anything that she couldn't find right away, she assumed went down the duct.

Well, if you can believe it, this morning, she found that damn jewel. It had fallen behind her mirror. And she was crying again. Dang. She is like one of those dolls you keep filling up with water because they keep crying! She was just so happy and relieved that she found the thing.

Gosh, I hate to think what she's going to be like when she loses something like a keychain. But the good part is, I know she feels and she isn't a psychopath. Did something right for once.