Spy Versus Spy: How I Keep My Son On His Toes

My child is adorable but incredibly devious. He’s clever, sneaky and I never see his brilliance coming. I’ve come to expect the unexpected raising him, and my life has been enriched for it. He’s a secret agent of sass; for that and many other reasons, I love him.

Take a couple weeks ago, for example. I came home from work and my son was all up in my grill wanting to know if I had any work to do and if so, when I might be starting. It seemed innocent enough. I mean, obviously he wanted to hang out with me and needed to be reassured that I would be keeping him company. Right? Wrong. I could not have been more wrong.

Eventually, I settled in to write my weekly column on the sofa. I was hard at work and concentrating on making editorial deadline magic happen when it happened. My cursor was going crazy. Words were popping in that I didn’t type. My blog was becoming incoherent. My mind flashed back to the time my son used my laptop to anchor his fort and it fell on the floor. I cursed under my breath and then I heard it. The giggle.

I noticed something weird plugged in to my laptop USB port. The giggling intensified until I realized what that USB key actually was. It was the receiver for my boyfriend’s wireless keyboard. My laptop had been hijacked from afar by my offspring. I had to laugh. I couldn’t believe he had pulled one over on me.

He triumphantly bounced into the room. “How’s the writing going, Mommy? Anything INTERESTING HAPPEN?” He snickered gleefully. I conceded defeat and he cheered. He savoured his victory. He thought he was pretty clever.

This weekend, we were having a FaceTime call, and once again he thought he was more clever than me. He scrutinized my smile closely.

“Mommy, wait a minute. Let me see your teeth,” he insisted, suspiciously.

“Why?” I asked innocently.

“I have a suspicion! I suspect you have been eating my popcorn!” he accused, full of righteous indignation. I saw an opening.

“I haven’t been eating your popcorn. I’ve been eating your Popsicles. You have popcorn?” I asked, hopefully. I love popcorn. I also love eating my son’s popsicles when he isn’t home. Fear flashed in his eyes, and his protective nature over his snacks won out in the end.

“Never mind! Moving right along!” he conceded. He might have won the keyboard war, but I won the snacks and he never even saw it coming. I felt like I needed my own theme music as I searched his bedroom for his popcorn stash. Turns out he’s not the only secret agent of sass in the family. He’s just the only one with a 7:30 bedtime.