A Pet Peeve

One thing that bothers me a lot is when someone is looking for something, I tell them where I think it is, they look in that exact location and not an inch to the left or right.  Then they tell me they can't find the object and I walk over to look and it is just next to where I said it was.  My memory is pretty good when it comes to locating random objects in our house, but I may be off by a few feet.  So when I tell someone where something is I expect them to also look in the nearby vicinity for the object.  For example, if I say something is on the right side of the desk and you don't see it there then look on the left side of the desk too.

Brad and Vince both struggle with this concept from time to time.  (I admit that I sometimes don't see things that are right under my nose too)  I decided that it is probably not worth the effort to change Brad so I am working on training Vince (hopefully his wife appreciates this someday) to look all around before telling me he can't find something.  I can remember growing up when I would ask my mom if she knew where something of mine was she would tell me and then I would go look where she told me.  If I couldn't find it I would go and tell her it wasn't there.  Then she would ask me if I did a really good job looking and of course I would say "yes".  She would then inform me that if she went to the location and the object was where she told me that I would be in "big trouble".  She never did say what the consequences were, but apparently "big trouble" was scary enough for me.  I would run and check all over the area she told me and usually find what I was looking for.  I would get a little excited when I couldn't find it and then my mom would come look and she couldn't find it either.  It was like a small victory even though the object we were looking for was still missing.  At least I could prove that I did a good job looking!

Sometime in the last couple weeks Vince was looking for one of his toys.  I told him it was in the toy closet.  He went to look, couldn't find it and then started yelling to me that he couldn't find it.  I was upstairs and in the process of putting Joel down for a nap.  I was not enjoying the yelling at all.  I said "ugh" and half growled under my breath and told him to look again and I would be right there.  The toy he was looking for was in the toy closet but under another toy.  We had a nice talk about how to look all around and under things when you are missing something.  I think this talk is going to need to be repeated several more times before he completely understands.

That night at bedtime he said he wanted Pet the Dinosaur and asked me to go downstairs and get him.  I agreed under the condition Vince put his pajamas on while I was downstairs.  I asked Vince where Pet the Dinosaur was and he said by the back door.  Cecilia and I went looking.  We couldn't find him.  So I yelled up the stairs and asked Vince again where to look for the dinosaur.  He said "ugh" and half growled under his breath and told me to look again by the back door.  Then I lifted up several shoes and a bag and found the dinosaur!  Surprisingly Vince has a pretty good memory when it comes to remembering where he or Joel left something.

When I heard Vince tell me the same thing I told him and in the same tone all I could do was laugh!  He was right I needed to look again.  It also made me realize that my attitude with him earlier in the day wasn't very nice.  It had more to do with him waking his brother than asking for more help, but he obviously didn't understand that part.  Just another reminder that the kids are always watching and learning from me.