You never know

One of the joys of living with a two-year-old is - well, it's also one of the real challenges of living with a two-year-old. It's the simple fact that you never know exactly what you're going to get in the way of a response, when you ask your little girl or boy what you think is a straightforward question.

Cleo, we've got an hour before we have to pick up Mommy. Would you like to go to a bookstore, or a cafe? I was thinking that we could go to West Virginia and play with my bells. Cleo, would you like to wear this blue sweater, or this red sweater? I would like to wear them both. And on, and on: even the tightest, most clearly spelled out question can be quickly evaded, or altered, or redoubled, through the creative mind of a two-year-old.

As a result, it's always interesting when Cleo announces that she'd like to listen to some music. Okay, I say: can you pick a CD? And she's happy to - but, as she searches the choices that lie within her short arm's reach, it's already a given that she'll somehow ignore the dozens of options that seem appropriate, or appealing, to me, and stumble upon something else. As she did, in fact, a few days ago, when she toddled over to me a few minutes later, with a disc by P.M. Dawn in her hands.

P.M. Dawn, you ask? Exactly: I did, too. Turns out they were a hip-hop duo active in the 1980s and early 1990s; L. bought an album of theirs back in the day, and it had then sat on our rack for years without being played, until Cleo nimbly avoided the Mozart, the Zeppelin, the lovely blues albums and collections of old favorites, and dragged this relic into my view.

But why fight it, right? I meant it when I said, above, that such unexpected turns are a real joy. And so we put it on, and even turned it up, and bobbed to the sample of Spandau Ballet. And long after the music had ended, and Cleo was in bed, I looked the band up, and now I know something new, about an act that I'd never encountered before. In fact, thanks to Wikipedia, I now know, too, that the two members of the band lost, when they were children, their two-year-old sibling in a drowning accident.

You never know what the next moment brings, and so you hold on to this one, and try to enjoy it as fully as possible. Even if it means putting one sweater on over another one.