Beech Tree News Network

I had a weekend to myself this past weekend.  Garey was attending a family reunion in Alabama, Natalie had drill in Richmond, and Sabria was with her dad.  It wasn’t to be a relaxing time reading or watching TV; I had already planned my activities, punctuated by the full-page list on the kitchen counter.
    My granddaughter is a climber.  She is also one of those kids who doesn’t play with toys.  There are a few things that hold her attention, like the tea set my friend, Sue Grise, gave her, the toy stethoscope she uses to check my heart, and a stuffed monkey and tiger cub that she refers to as Mama Kitty and Baby Kitty, but everything else is an incidental part of a toy box that must be scattered across the living room floor.  Most of Sabria’s days are a game of “I Spy.”  She spies something that’s not part of the toy box then sets out to claim it for herself.  (I’m working on a line of non-toy toys for children like her.  The line will include nesting Tupperware bowls, empty Windex spray bottles, and a control panel from a Kenmore dishwasher.)
    There were a couple of incidents that motivated me to do some moving and restructuring to the house this weekend.  The first involved my jewelry armoire, a string of beads, and Sabria’s big toe.  I’m pretty much one of those crazy people who is always checking on a child who has been put in my care.  I tend to worry about unforeseen tragedy, and in Sabria’s case, the worry is justified, but she is curious and she is quick.  On the armoire-beads-toe day, she had gotten into my bedroom, gotten the string of beads, and somehow gotten them tangled in her ponytail then looped around the big toe on her left foot.  I was alerted to her predicament by an agonizing, “Stuck Gee! Stuck!” cry from the bedroom.
    The second incident involved the piano.  I was washing dishes in the kitchen when I heard sounds coming from the piano keys that were reminiscent of Schoenberg tone rows—the kind of eerie music that might serve as a back drop for a Stephen King movie.  On further examination, I found Sabria walking on the piano keys, holding picture frames of family photos.  The living room floor is ceramic tile, and I had a sudden premonition of broken glass and severed fingers.  The piano bench would definitely be the first item to go into storage.
    I spent the weekend moving several things into storage.  The jewelry armoire went, as well as a couple of storage bins that were a bit too close to the six-shelf bookcase (they were just big steps to Sabria).  I removed a lot of clutter that had caused some angst between us, things like wrapping paper, flashlights, pencils and a bag of USB cords.  I fixed a board with pockets that I tacked to the wall, a couple of feet from the ceiling, to hold the TV remotes and some ink pens.  I tried to look at each room as she would then remove anything that would “tempt her beyond what she was able to bear.”
    When Sabria got home Sunday night, she looked around as if she had landed on some alien planet.  She had that “something’s not right here” look that appears on my face when I discover someone has eaten the last piece of apple pie.  “It’s okay, Baby,” I told her, “Gee’s just put up a few things up.” 
    She noticed the TV remotes in their new pocket holders on the wall.  “Up,” she said, as she slid her hand up the wall.  “No up,” I said.  She tried the file cabinet drawer that she’s always pilfering through.  I fixed the broken lock over the weekend.  “Open,” she said.  “No open,” I said.
 She tried a few more things before going to bed Sunday night.  Everything held.  I was quite pleased with myself until I tried to get into the file cabinet myself.  I couldn’t get it open either.  “Oh well,” I told myself, “Just give her a few days, and I’m sure she’ll figure out how the lock works.  I can get my journals then.”