I guess this is as good a time as any to record this story for posterity. It is not a good story by any objective measure but it is useful. Sometimes when Adam has completely lost it but he's receptive to a little help for collecting himself, I tell him this story to soothe, comfort, or pacify him. It has worked for months now. Only occasionally do I need to repeat it or pull out "The Montreal Story" for the effect to be complete.
"When I was a girl, my favourite holiday was .. Hallowe'en. There were three things that I reeeeeally liked about Hallowe'en. The first thing I really liked about Hallowe'en was making a costume. One year, I had a Queen costume. The same year I had a Queen constume, Uncle Ian had a Mummy costume - the type of Mummy with bandages from head to toe. Another thing that I really liked about Hallowe'en was trick-or-treating. I would always trick-or-treat with Uncle Ian. We'd go from door to door and knock on the door. And when someone answered the door, we'd say, "Trick or Treat!" Then usually, the person who answered the door would give us CANDY. We'd always say thank you for the candy. The third thing that I reeeeally liked about Hallowe'en was ... Eating All The Candy! The End."
Sometimes, if you ask Adam to tell you a story, he'll make a variation on this one, which is pretty darn cute, I think. That or he'll tell a story based loosely on Dion's story of visiting Chihung Szeto.
Another result of this story was that Adam got it in his head that (or rather just like saying that) he and Clare were going to go trick-or-treating by themselves and the Rob, Becky, Dion, and I were going to stay home to hand out candy. And what was Naomi going to do? Uhmm. Sleep. Naomi was going to be sleeping. He wasn't serious about this plan - he doesn't even like to go down the hall from our apartment to greet people at the elevator by himself - but he did enjoy sharing his plan.
If you're starting with this post, keep scrolling down, I've posted several more times tonight.
