When kids start asking 'why?' ALL the time.

Emily has her own list of questions that are impossible to answer. Photo / Getty

I have a constant (relentless) stream of commentary in my life from my exuberant two-year-old. We have recently hit the WHY stage, a stage other parents had told (warned) me about.

My day usually starts with me trying very hard to respectfully and earnestly answer his questions in a patient and kind way befitting the kind of parent I like to imagine I am before reality smacks me in the face.

For example:

The toddler picks up the back of an earring: "Was that?"
Me: "It's the back of an earring."
"Was that?"
"It holds the earring in your ear so the earring doesn't fall out of your ear."
"Why?"
"Why do you not want an earring to fall out? Because you'd lose it."
"No, WHY?"
"Why would you wear an earring? Because earrings look nice."
"Why?"
"Because they can be shiny or pretty or have colours. You like your shoes because they look cool. Mumma likes her earrings because they look cool."
"WHY?"

By the end of the day the conversation is:

The toddler: "Was that?"
Me: "I dunno Eddie, it's a thing."
"Why?"
"It just is."

Sometimes I end up having an existential crisis trying to work out how to answer him.

The toddler: "Was that?"
Me: "A razor."
"What you doing?"
"Shaving my legs."
"Why?"
"Because...I...ummm I don't like them hairy."
"Why?"
"I umm...well...patriarchial standards of beauty dictate...ummm probably subconscious societal pressures..I am...mummy is a feminist but...there's...well..."
"Was that?" (Points to piece of fluff on the ground).

"What choo doing dear mama?" is heard around 67,000 times a day in my whare. I have started to provide a gratingly chipper commentary to attempt to preempt his interrogation:

"Mama is making a coffee."
"Mama is soaking onesies after a poo explosion!"
"Mama is rocking and shushing and singing to the baby."
"Mama is trying to get you to eat just one thing that isn't a biscuit."
"Mama is losing her will to live."
"Mama is imagining Jason Momoa naked changing the sheets on the bed." (I'm too tired to even imagine anything more than that and frankly not having to change the sheets is quite a turn on in itself).

Still, even though I'm providing constant updates, I get: "Was that? What choo doing? WHY?"

And don't toddlers just have a wonderful way of expressing themselves in public when they practise their language skills?

A while back I changed his nappy in the back of the car because he refuses to go into a public toilet without freaking out. The next day I told him we would need to do a nappy change and he yelled in the middle of the Warehouse:

"PLEASE DON PUT ME INNA BOOT DEAR MAMA I SORRY!"

All of these alarmed shoppers stared at me. I tried to explain but it just came out as, "I don't...I mean I put him in the boot once...but I was...He wasn't in the boot...."

Last week his father yelled from the shower that the water had gone cold. I couldn't hear him over the sound of the shower so he yelled to Eddie: "Tell Mama the shower is cold!"

Eddie has decided to inform every single person we have met since that day: "My deddy did yell at my dear mama and he did yell vewy loud at her. Den he did yell at Eddie vewy loud and he did yell at us a lot."

We tried to explain there is "bad yelling" which is angry. And "raised voices because you can't hear because it's noisy, like when someone is in the shower". That of course turned into telling strangers: "My deddy said Eddie not say he yelling but he done yell".

Thanks kid.

So I figure I'm just going to be more like my kid and just start relentlessly harassing everyone by asking WHY WHY WHY all the time. I thought I'd start with a list (because everyone likes lists, right?). Here it is:

QUESTIONS THAT ARE IMPOSSIBLE TO ANSWER - MAMA'S EDITION:

1. Why do toilets with change tables have hair dryers in them? They may as well have an actual fire in there. Kids would be less terrified.

2. How is it that babies KNOW when you pour a glass of wine? You can time it perfectly with feeds but as soon as the parent juice (oh dear God that sounds revolting but I'm going to keep it) hits the glass they're like "You rang?" Except instead of saying that they just scream as if they're being tortured.

3. Would you get jail time if you hit your partner with a shovel for saying "Baby slept well last night?" in the morning when you woke up 800 times? Or would the judge see that as justifiable?

4. Is there a line you can cross with food bribery? The other day I told my son I would buy him a lawnmower if he had one more bite of his toast. Lawnmowers are, like, $800.

5. Are people who buy toddlers Dora the Explorer sticker sets that have 10,000 stickers in them actually the Antichrist? Rhetorical question obviously - they are.

6. Where did you put the pegs? How do kids have a shed-load of toys and yet they have a meltdown if you chuck out the empty tissue box because that's their "favroit waaaan".
HOW DO THEY NOTICE THAT YOU THREW IT AWAY? Or is that just mine? Please say it's not just mine?

7. Finally, do you think they time out their best lines for maximum impact? The other night I was so tired, almost to the point of tears, and the toddler climbed on my lap and said, "Fank you dear mama for keep Eddie safe and love Eddie".

I mean, HEART MELT.

I will buy you a lawnmower my love. And replace the tissue box. And I promise I'll never put you in the boot again.

- nzherald.co.nz

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