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Did You Just Lick Me???
59 Plays7 months ago
A very short story about a tiny moment that put everything in perspective.
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Transcript
Introduction to 'Life's Effin' Nuts'
00:00:03
Speaker
Welcome, friends, to life's effin' nuts. I am JR, one man's stories and ruminations on being human in an upside down world.
00:00:22
Speaker
I have a seven year old son. He's a pretty silly little guy. He likes to laugh a lot and play a lot. And sometimes like little traditions evolve for us without us even realizing
Nighttime Routine with Son
00:00:33
Speaker
it. So for instance, our nighttime routine, we do like his reading and writing and homework stuff for about 45 minutes, and then we watch around 20, 25 minutes of a movie together, and then he goes to bed. But at some point, this tradition emerged. where I'll set a timer for how long we're gonna watch the movie and then the timer would go off and I would reach for the TV remote control to turn off the TV and then we would just like start like wrestling but like play wrestling he loves play wrestling we're really wrestling but like no one's trying to hurt each other obviously and so it became this like formalized thing it's like a thing that we have now where we just do this like sort of epic battle
00:01:14
Speaker
And sometimes now they'll last seven or eight minutes. We have this new beanbag in the living room. So now the tumbling and the flipping and the just all the wrestling moves can have gotten even more exciting and intense with this big beanbag. He'll often like do like like headlocks on me and things like that. And then sometimes when he's doing a headlock, I'll like bite him a little bit on his arm. Not hard, but it's like a playful kind of thing. If I try to bite him on his arm, that he'll try to lick me, which I hate. It's like the grossest thing ever. I do not want to be licked by his seven year old. Pretty funny thing. I enjoy it a lot. He enjoys it a lot. And so a couple of nights ago, we're doing our normal evening little wrestling thing.
00:01:56
Speaker
I don't even think I tried to bite him that night. When he was little, when he was like a little baby or like whatever, two, three years old, he wasn't a big
Preschool Anecdote: The Biting Incident
00:02:04
Speaker
biter. He had, there was kids at his preschool who were like biters. If they would get upset with someone at school, there's like bite someone. And I always found that like slightly hilarious. And I would never say anything because it was like a serious issue at the school in some ways. If your kid was a biter, it was like a big deal. like You gotta find a way to just get them to stop biting. But for me, it was always kind of funny. And like sometimes my my son would come home from school and he would just like give me a rundown of what happened at school in a very matter of fact way. and And there's one particular day that I remember because it was just so funny. That's just how matter of factly he said it. He calls me Papa JR. Yeah, Papa JR. It was good. Like we learned about animals or whatever. And Finn invited Valerie. I had a good sandwich for lunch.
00:02:50
Speaker
But something about that, it's become like part of our language lexicon. This was a long time, it was when he was in preschool and now he's in second grade and I'll be like, hey sweetie, how was your day? Did Valerie bite at Finn? It's like a running like gag or joke
The Flossing and Finger Licking Episode
00:03:03
Speaker
we have. So something around that, like the absurdity of kids biting, when he was little and we used to wrestle, I would play that up a little bit and then pretend to like, bite him a little bit or something like that and so it became like part of the hilarious culture that he and i share anyway so ah couple nights ago i think he was like giving me a headlock and i don't even think that i went for like the little faux bit attempt but he store it in his brain that i did somehow we finished the battle After that, we do teeth brushing and teeth flossing. And in the evening, I brush his teeth. and That's what the dentist told us that he can brush his own in the morning. But for the time being, it's good to have a grown up brush the teeth at night just to make sure you're getting a real thorough scrub of those old pearly whites.
00:03:47
Speaker
I was flossing him, flossing his teeth. As I'm flossing, he realized that he could like lick my fingers. And it was like this moment of like revelation for him. Because like I said, we have this whole interplay where I'm trying to bite his arm and he's trying to lick my arm or whatever it is. And like, we're both like squirming and giggling and all this stuff. And he realized that I have to, I'm not going to not floss his teeth. So I'm in there flossing his teeth. And he starts just like swishing his little seven year old tongue around like wildly.
Playfulness and Absurd Laughter
00:04:21
Speaker
And there was something about it that to me was like,
00:04:25
Speaker
Just the funniest thing that I experienced in a long time. Like it was so absurd. It was absurd in the moment, the actual act of this little seven year old swishing his tongue around and and like having this regulatory moment where he realizes that he has the upper hand on Papa. But then it's even funnier with like the years long context of all like the biting and the licking and things like that. And so if something about it, I just started cracking up.
00:04:56
Speaker
I'm kind of like ah a little bit of a tightly wound person. It kind of takes a lot for me to like to laugh in a way where I like fully release or like fully lose control. I would say it's rare that I laugh uncontrollably and something about that in that moment just the the absurdity of it. I just started laughing uncontrollably and then he started laughing uncontrollably. When I floss his teeth he sits on the ledge of the bathtub. He's sitting there in his little in his cute little Pikachu pajamas or whatever and flossing his teeth and we're like staring at each other laughing uncontrollably and then I have this moment as I'm laughing uncontrollably and feeling this deep sense of
00:05:40
Speaker
Release energetic release my experience the kids have like this genius for just knowing how to play Move through life in a way that's not stuffy or serious or over serious like they're just to me it just seems like they're just geniuses and also it like regulating their emotional and their nervous systems like getting those releases and and also like just like being in on the joke of life.
Finding Humor in Life's Seriousness
00:06:08
Speaker
I know there's like for me as a grown-up with all these pressures and stresses and obligations and responsibilities, life does become like legitimately serious and and then that's my own like pressures and stresses and then following the news and what's happening in the world and the condition of our species, of our society, death, the wars, the violence. It's like pretty fucking intense.
00:06:33
Speaker
and pretty dreary and and and depressing yet. In spite of all that, i I have a hypothesis. I'm not sure where exactly I stand on my like overall life philosophy, but I do have this sort of little hypothesis that like, in spite of our species, many disgusting sides and faults, there is like this humor, this underlying humor of life. I think that's the reason we laugh.
00:07:01
Speaker
There's this thing that we can tap into where there's just such a hilarity or an absurdity to existence. I think especially for humans who have consciousness, who are like aware of their own existence, sometimes there's just such an absurdity underlying everything. And to me, in that moment, as my son and I, they're in the bathroom, just like uncontrollably laughing our heads off, tears streaming down our face, and I'm looking at this little child, this seven-year-old, and I'm like, this kid is a fucking genius, dude. He knows what's up. He gets it. He gets life. He understands that there is like this levity, this hilarity that can be accessed. And it's like medicine.
00:07:47
Speaker
My coil gets very tightly wound and there are a lot of upsetting, disturbing things that I'm witnessing in our species, in our world, in our society. And so I'm not advocating for myself to just be like, oh, life is ah one big joke and what a great life. But I do think it's very healing and medicinal in a lot of ways to find those moments when possible, when I can have that full release, when I can Just be a little bit more like my seven year old son.
Solace in Father-Son Bonding
00:08:18
Speaker
Be in on the joke of life a little bit. Play. Be silly. Let go. Like I said, for me, it's not a light switch. Like sometimes I can have that intention. I can be like, damn, dude, my coil is wound very tight right now. I'm stressed out about this. I'm stressed out about that. It's not a ah flip that I can switch easily.
00:08:34
Speaker
I can have the intention. I can know JR this ain't good for you to be as tightly wound as stressed as worried as you are like you need a release dude. I can look for moments and opportunities where I can lean into that and also for me having a seven-year-old I can When all else fails, just like hang out with him and slow down and get into his world a little bit. Cause he is a pretty happy guy. He likes to play. He likes to laugh. And yeah, I guess that's a blessing for me that I do have that in my life. That when all else fails, I can drop all my adult drama and stress and simplify to this beautiful child's level.
Conclusion and Future Episodes
00:09:19
Speaker
Thanks for tuning in to Life's F&Nuts. I hope you enjoyed that story. New episodes drop every Tuesday on Apple Podcasts and Spotify, and you can follow us on social media at Life's F and&Nuts Podcast. I'm JR, see you guys soon.