Hard Lessons

When I was a kid, I left my favorite book outside our apartment, on a picnic table in the yard. Horton Hatches the Egg. I loved that book. It was my best friend. I took it everywhere with me. That night, it rained. Mum wouldn't let me go outside to get it, because it was quite a storm...so I knelt on the back of the couch and watched my beloved book get rained on, and I cried and cried. It was ruined, and I was devastated...but I learned a lesson. Bird's father let him have his old iPhone. Bird loved it, and played with the apps constantly. He'd fall asleep with it. Little Dude still wets the bed. The iPhone got wet and died, and T bought the boy an iTouch. Bird has played with it non-stop since he got it, downloading apps and watching videos. It has seen him through long waits in doctors' offices, long car trips, and is part of his bedtime ritual - play in his room until lights out, then play with the iThing (as I call it) until it's time to wrap it up and go to sleep. Then the iThing gets plugged in to charge and Little Dude goes to sleep. Can you see where this is going? Thursday evening, Bird told me his iThing wouldn't work. I told him to bring it to me - sometimes the battery is really, really dead and it just needs charging...but this time I could see something wrong. There was moisture inside the screen. I asked him if it had gotten wet...and he had to admit that he'd fallen asleep with it and wet the bed. I put the iThing in a bag of rice - sometimes it helps. Tonight, I tried to plug it in, but it wouldn't take a charge, wouldn't turn on. I'm going to try again tomorrow night, but don't hold out much hope. The iThing is dead...and Little Dude?? He's devastated. He's been crying in his room all evening. He was warned - if anything happened to the iThing, he would not get another. It is an expensive toy for a child to have. He was warned that he must look after it, was responsible for keeping track of it, and that he could not sleep with it, because if it got wet, it could be ruined. I hurt for him. We all have to learn this lesson...and it's not easy to watch him suffer his loss. In a perfect world, I could let him be sad for a while, let him learn his lesson, and then replace it eventually...but I can't. I don't have the money to buy such an extravagant thing, and T made it clear when he bought it that he would not replace it...so Bird's most cherished possession, his prize, the best thing his Daddy gave him (and part of his attachment to it is that it came from his father, so it's precious) is lost to him. It's a hard lesson, and it sucks.