Ian is very prone to issues. He deals with the world on an emotional level, which doesn’t leave much room for logic. This means he’s a wonderfully sensitive and caring child, but it also means that he’s as rational as a drive-thru liquor store. Calm and reasoned explanations don’t go very far with Ian. It doesn’t matter that the roller-coaster is safe, designed specifically for children, quite slow, looks like Shamu, that no one has died or is harmed on a regular basis, and that people wouldn’t wait hours in line bathed in glaring sunshine if they had. He’s afraid, and that’s all that matters; all that is.

We were walking through the woods, looking for the deer we’d seen the previous night. Ian was holding my hand, standing slightly behind so that my face could break the night’s crop of spiderwebs for him. I was brushing strands from my eyelashes and hair when he suddenly pulled his hand away. He stepped back, bringing his arms to his chest.

‘There’s a spider on you.’

We looked, all over. Both my wife and I, scrutinized every inch of my body, looked down every sleeve, every sock. There was no spider. My shirt did have a logo that, in the dappled light of a forest path, might resemble a buggish creature if glimpsed from the corner of an eye. But no spider.

‘No spider, kiddo. Let’s go.’ I reached for his hand and he pulled farther away. His eyes were wide and his terror was growing.

‘There’s a spider on you.’ I reached, he retreated.

‘Really, Mommy and I both looked. If there was a spider, it’s gone now.’ He shook his head. I saw where this was headed. I flinched and brushed at my sleeve. I stamped my foot on the ground, twice, and ground my shoe into the gravel. ‘Oh! There, I got it.’

He took my hand and we continued our walk.

During our first year of marriage, I was overjoyed to learn that my wife liked Star Trek: The Next Generation. Her interest in science fiction goes as far as recognizing that I’m a fan, so it was a treat to sit with her each night, making fun of Deanna’s hair and Riker’s catty attitude. Out of this nightly ritual arose what has become a family tradition: making up song lyrics. During the opening credits we’d sing lyrics for the theme music, describing the show and its characters.

Data is yellow and gold / and he likes to whistle and tell bad jokes...

We didn’t have many friends.

We also enjoy word play in our house. We like puns and rhyming and silly songs. Soon after he learned the alphabet song, Ian started substituting the letter ‘G’ with non sequiturs—car, shoe, bus—to make us laugh. It usually worked.

These tendencies have combined with another disturbing obsession of mine—The Golden Girls—to become one of the strangest and, oddly, one of the most fun of our family games: Thank You for Being a Friend. In order to play you must be familiar with the following: rhyming, syllables, gerunds, and The Golden Girls theme song. But only its first line. The rules are simple:

1. Replace ‘being’ with any bisyllabic gerund
2. Replace ‘a friend’ with any bisyllabic, near-rhyming noun or phrase
3. The resulting phrase must make logical, if freaky, sense

It goes without saying that you must sing your mad lib. Believe it or not, this game has provided our family with literally minutes of entertainment. Actually, it’s very addictive and difficult to stop. It’s also turned out to be a wonderful way for Ian to stretch his linguistic flexibility. (I love Dr. Seuss, but you can see it coming.) Here are some of our more interesting entries, some of which are Ian’s:

Thank you for…

• ...waking the dead.
• ...wearing Depends.
• ...dredging the Senne.
• ...making your bed.
• ...shaving my head.

You’re already playing, aren’t you?

The Home Depot hosts free Kids Workshops on the first Saturday of each month. Kids and parents can build kit projects like bird houses, helicopters, pirate ships, and, oddly-specific enough, ‘Declaration of Independence frames’. We’ve missed the last two workshops since learning of the program, but my wife and I pulled one out of our good-parent hat this weekend, and made a special effort to get Ian’s hands on a hammer and nails.

We missed the pirate ship, but this weekend the kids were building planters. I don’t build, but the project kits are non-threatening: shrink-wrapped, pre-cut, starter holes pre-drilled, and other hyphenated adjectives that help men like me maintain our thin veneers of masculinity in front of our children. The kids are given Home Depot aprons to wear for each session, and a project pin to commemorate the event.

Ian did a fantastic job, holding his hammer to balance force and accuracy, and taking careful aim of my thumbnail. He talked throughout the project, his mind focused on the outcome rather than the process. What should we plant? What can we plant? Will the flowers die? Can I keep them in my room?

At one point he was the only child in the room, and he had the staff’s full attention. They complimented his handling of the hardware, and praised his use of safety goggles. He rewarded them with tips on the proper care of house plants.

‘They need dirt, lots of sun, and water. And love.’

I’m not a morning person in the same way that Grendel isn’t a people person. Either combination is equally unfortunate for mead halls and chipper four-year-olds. I didn’t realize this about myself until after Ian was born and weaned, when my wife confessed that she let me sleep through the nights because I was such a jerk when woken. I’ve tried to learn patience and exercise a little self-control, but neither is easy at the best of times, let alone at four in the morning with a sleep-addled brain. I also tend not to sleep well, and often wake with pounding headaches.

By contrast, Ian is a bushy-tailed camp counselor with eyes wide as the rising sun is bright, ready for a full day of sing-a-longs when all you want to do is crawl to the bottom of your sleeping bag and hibernate. Mornings can be...rough.

He usually comes into the bathroom when I’ve finished my shower. His room shares a wall with our bathroom, and I can hear when he wakes, tossing and shifting and jumping from the bed. I can hear the thud of his feet and the click of his door, and I mentally brace myself for the awkward turning of the bathroom doorknob. He slowly opens the door and shields his eyes from the glare of the bathroom lights. ‘Morning, Daddy,’ which isn’t a bad way to start the day.

Except that he forgets to shut the bathroom door, and Ian’s cat follows on his heels and starts gnawing on mine. The heat leaves with the cat and I turn to find Ian standing where I need to be. We circle each other in our too-small bathroom as Ian’s running commentary of the morning drowns NPR and the weather forecast.

All of which doesn’t sound so bad after I’ve dressed and had my coffee. Three sentences doesn’t seem to justify the levels of frustration and annoyance with my son, a boy whose first thought in the morning is to find and greet his daddy.

I hugged Ian before I left this morning, a thermos of coffee in one hand and a dread of afternoon meetings in the other. I tugged my hat onto my head, smiled at my son, said I loved him. He took a swig from his morning tea and smiled. He raised a thumb into the air, ‘Thumb war?’

I wouldn’t say that music has always been an integral part of my life, but it’s always been a part of it. I remember music class in elementary school, clapping rhythms written on the chalkboard and singing Silent Night for the principal—before it was illegal. Later I took saxophone lessons and joined the school band, which lasted through my freshman year in college. I didn’t join a choir until three years ago, but I’ve always enjoyed singing, and took it for granted that I knew how to read music.

I also remember Sesame Street and The Electric Company and Today’s Special. Even today, I can still vaguely recall tunes from the television of my childhood; songs about neighbors and letters and prepositions and ‘-tion’. Louie the Lightning Bug, and he didn’t even have his own show.

And all of these memories, all of this music cries in anguish and sorrow when faced with Barney.

There seems to be an underlying assumption among the producers of children’s programming that kids can’t, don’t want to, or shouldn’t sing. They can dance, shimmy, shake, whistle, hum, and even rhyme, but they are not allowed to sing.

‘But wait,’ you exclaim, ‘Barney sings all the time!’ Which is partly true. The music swells, beaming faces line up to prance across the stage, and Barney and Co. start to sing. And sooner than later they stop (usually at the end of a line) and talk. Talk! The music continues, I can hear what the melody should be, but for whatever reason—spite, global warming, the RIAA—Barney and friends simply speak the remaining lyrics. Enthusiastically, yes, but it’s still just talking.

Elmo tries, but singing one word to the tune of Jingle Bells over and over again won’t fool even the bubbliest three-year-old. And let’s not forget Dora and her band of amelodic misfits. Not only do they routinely drop the melody, they also shout at the top of their lungs. ‘I’m the map?’ How, exactly, does a song like I’m the Map teach my child music? American Idol would do a better job.

Music is either important, or it isn’t. Sing, or don’t. But don’t play with my son’s pitch; he has a good ear.