Can't Quit, Cold Turkey...by Grandpa Jim

We have a great grandson who was three when he and his folks came to stay with us for several months. Because we share our house with our youngest daughter and her husband, it means that little Elijah found himself with two parents, two grandparents, and two great grandparents all in the same house with him and his younger brother.

I think it was the abundance of adults in his life that caused him to be a little slow at bonding with Jean and me. He was getting a lot of attention from grandma and grandpa, and we tend to stay in our quarters a lot, so where was the need?

The only regular contact we had was at breakfast. It was our custom to ask, “How are you this morning, Elijah?” For a long time, he found it hard to respond, because we just weren’t that familiar to him. Finally, there came a morning when the boy’s dad (our grandson) told the boy that it was polite to answer when asked a question.

For a while, then, he’d say “fine” or something like it.

Then, one fine morning, he looked at me, rather curiously, and asked, “How are you, Grandpa Jim?” He caught me unaware, so I thought I’d “play along” a little, and said, “MmmmmmmmmAR-velous.” He laughed. After that, he couldn’t wait to ask, so that I’d repeat my long, overly dramatic answer, and he’d laugh heartily at such a predictable response.

Soon, of course, when I asked HIM how he was, he’d mimic me and say “marvelous” in the same way, and we’d both laugh. Months later, after the family had gone home to New Guinea, Elijah, now four, was given the phone to speak to us. I asked him how he was, and he quickly answered in the same old, exaggerated fashion.

His mother reports that she took Elijah to the market one day, and a stranger (woman) asked Elijah how he was, and he gave her the old MmmmmmmmmmAR-velous routine. She told his mom that she sure wished her boy had that kind of enthusiasm! Is he now a “marked man?”