THE PRICKS

We loaded two preschoolers into their car seats to go get their Covid and flu shots. Fragments of our preparatory narratives, mingled with embellishments and synapses entirely their own, wafted from the Generally Worried back seat as we drove through miserable rain.

It feels like a pine needle, one-two-done. I AM NOT GOING TO FOLLOW THE RULES. There will be stickers. I DON’T WANT BAND-AIDS. Not as bad as a bee sting and it doesn’t last. THEN WE WILL GO SEE THE TRACTORS. Maybe there will be cake. I AM NOT WEARING A MASK. I’m going to hide under the table.

When we got there, pandemic-era protocols had us idle in the parking lot while checking in through a link on my phone. The inactivity, now that we’d finally reached the brink of the Terrible Thing, was unbearable for my son.

GO! LET’S GO IN NOW!! he kept yelling, while I tried to answer the call from the nurse and run through more endless, pointless questions.

Finally we were cleared to do our damnedest to get two spirited, terrified souls out of their car seats, into the rain, into masks, and into the building. We let them bring their Familiars (a gray, elaborately ripped rag named Raggles, and a severely tired looking owl named Wesley) despite the certainty that they’d pick up some plague from the carpeting in the waiting room.

We had the good fortune to witness a Big Kid get her shot and pop up smiling and ready to walk out the door. That seemed a good start. Then there was a short wait while the nurse went to get the syringes.

WHERE ARE THE PRICKS My son started yelling, over and over. IS SHE BRINGING THE PRICKS NOW.

The nurse emerged from the hallway holding four syringes, and approached us kindly, asking after Wesley, remarking that he looked quite loved. (Raggles got no greeting, apparently having been mistaken for a snot-rag or a stolen waft of ancient linen from a recently exhumed mummy.)

My daughter, who had gone into full-blown rigor mortis on her father’s lap, would have nothing to do with remarks about her owl, but did show a remarkable, tiny sign of life when the nurse mentioned a purple band-aid. (She has a True Passion for band-aids.)

I volunteered my son to go first, believing that if he had the time to remember he’s very nearly stronger than I am, he might simply launch himself through the window behind me. I tugged his wiry little arm out of his sweater and cotton shirt, feeling sorry for his partial nakedness against the cool waiting-room air.

The nurse was friendly and efficient, but the sensation of the first shot was clearly NOT A PINE NEEDLE. I don’t recall how exactly the nurse and I maneuvered him through the second shot, but he was yelling NO BAND-AIDS and trying to climb over my shoulder before the second needle was out of his arm.

I quickly levered the little chicken-wing back into its layers of clothing and told him what a great job he’d done. I DID NOT, he said. I DID NOT FOLLOW THE RULES. Defiance seemed to be the only balm he could find, so he was using it liberally, chucking any surplus with his husky voice at the uselessly decorated walls (wan flowers or uninspired zoo animals, probably).

Despite witnessing her brother’s distress, Sister made it through with little more than a whimper and a flinch, and managed to maintain focus on that purple band-aid long enough to find that her equilibrium had returned, within the unbreachible orb of Daddy’s arms.

We had to wait for their vaccination cards at the front desk. I DON’T WANT ANY CARDS, my son said loudly. He lobbied hard and fast to return to the car immediately and drive away. I explained that he and I could go out to the car and get buckled in, but Daddy and Sister would have to stay and wait for the cards, so we wouldn’t be actually driving anywhere yet.

Sitting in a non-moving vehicle at this point sounded absolutely terrible to him, as I suspected it would. He pivoted with speed and certainty.

May I touch that beautiful glass? he said, suddenly earnestly enchanted with a check-out window that had been stickered with one of those shiny privacy shields (this one had what looked like glinting marbles on it). Yes! I said, and took him over to it. He touched a few of the (somewhat disappointingly) two-dimensional orbs and then asked, still with committed engagement, And that one?, pointing to the next window over.

We migrated down the hall, touching “beautiful glass,” despite the clearly deflating reality that the apparent textures were not at all actual marbles, until the damned cards showed up.

I have little doubt that a) the “beautiful glass” was sincerely interesting to my son’s texture-oriented brain, AND b) that it would not have caught his attention had he not been under duress.

The kid chose to rev up his inclination, his natural tendency, towards fascination with textures— because that was the one trait of his that would most improve the Terrible Situation, given the limitations that had become clear to him. After all, defiance had changed nothing; reasoning— also nada. Plus, Sister was no help as she seemed to be Pretty Much Fine, which meant that no Mob-Mentality Lightning Hysteria Campaign seemed likely (these are terribly effective against tired parents).

If your go-tos aren’t getting any purchase— if, for example, MORE COFFEE or PHONE A FRIEND haven’t helped whatever Terrible Situation you face— I’m here to report, by the Reminding Grace of an unusually determined preschooler, that there are other tools in your belt.

But what are they? you might ask. Well, they are probably not made exactly for the job—but then, my children have managed to move firewood with kitchen tongs, hook toys together with hunks of tinfoil, and “make” a “fort” by standing near a pretty good bush.

So don’t hesitate to apply three sweaters and a raincoat against a snow-storm, or jumpstart your car with your lawnmower. Move on, move over, move ahead with what hasty grace you’re able to snatch from the ether, trailing inadequate tools and fast-vanishing disappointments behind you.

To be honest, we rarely have the perfect tool for the job. Humans are improvisers by evolutionary nature. (That’s what makes us, and crows, so perniciously successful at colonizing just about every crevice of the planet.)

So: when the pricks come for you, remember—suddenly, intensely—the captivating beauty of marbles.