Preschool Morning

I am totally leaving out the part how we got to school and they had four foot long pieces of sugar cane out, and how I munched and crunched down on some sugar cane in preschool this morning. I wanted to pull my camera out, but Son1 wasn't even into the sugar cane. So how in the world was I going to have them take my picture? For another time...

Son1 packed two diesel semi trucks in his backpack for Share and Tell at preschool. We arrived, and he pulled the trucks out and handed them to the teacher. Next, he spit out three sentences about trucks. The teacher's eyes almost rolled out of her head and her jaw dropped. "Did you hear what he said?" Ummm, something about trucks...no I really hadn't heard what he said. I produced a puzzled look. "He just recited three lines from the truck book I read for the very first time ever, yesterday! His trucks he brought to share are exactly the same color as in the book, doing the very same thing! See, look!" She grabbed the book, fumbled to find the right pages, and showed me. Son1 cocked his head to one side, and repeated the lines again. I knew what she was getting at. I smiled, masking my enthusiasm. Yes, I totally got it. Hubby and I have been totally getting it for some time, now. He has this incredible memory. Even tonight he got home and told me all about Peter and the Wolf that he saw produced at the symphony on his field trip. He told me all about the instruments, the different characters they represented, how the music went really fast, and then it slowed down. I didn't even know they were going to see Peter and the Wolf. But I totally got what the teacher was saying this morning. The kid has a memory. Ask him to tell you about George Washington or Martin Luther King, or more importantly, his Bible verses for Awanas or Cubbies. But I nodded and smiled, and turned away.

On second thought, I didn't want her to think I didn't share her enthusiasm. I turned back toward her, and asked her if I could tell her something without her thinking I was sick and twisted. She looked at me intently and was totally intrigued. I gave her a little story, totally not what she was expecting, but totally FARMER. I told her how Hubby's family is a card family. He started playing cards when he was four years old. When we were seriously dating he told me we couldn't get engaged until I learned to play cards. So I learned to play, learning the rules, learning basic strategy. But I didn't just want to be a warm body at the card table my soon to be in-laws could just trounce over. Nooo. Not me. I figured very quickly the art of counting cards, counting odds, memorizing 52 cards over and over in Hearts and Spades, and Poker. Eventually I learned Pinochle after we married. The only way for me to compete with my in-laws was with my memory. I also have a thing for numbers. They have always fascinated me since I could tell anyone that asked that I was 3 and 3/4 old. I love different algorithms, game theory, and speed of computation. I didn't babble all of that. No, I stopped at telling her that I had to learn to play cards to get engaged, and that my husband calls me Rain Woman because of my thing for numbers. I looked the teacher square in the eye and told her we hope our son can become a professional poker player with his memory. That stopped her in her tracks. Who says that stuff besides the Farmers? Now you would only get what I am talking about if you ever came to one of our tournaments in Virginia.

There was a pregnant pause. I smiled again, and started toward the door of the classroom. It took the teacher a minute. She caught me and said, "You mean like the movie that is out? The 21 movie?" Frightening isn't it? That is exactly what I meant, going to MIT and being a Black Jack player. "Yes!" I beamed. Now you know we will be perfectly happy with him going to a school of his choice, as long as he can beat his inlaws at cards. You folks with little girls that we knew from Teammates....we will inevitably move back to the Cold Coast, I mean East Coast. If you haven't started your girls playing cards....well, this mommy is making a rule. No dating unless they know how to play cards!