The boy knows what he wants

Josh cracked me up at the dentist the other day. Our dentist has a little machine in the waiting area like those found by the front door of many stores and restaurants. You put in a quarter, turn the crank and out comes a prize of the plastic toy or sticker variety. When a child is done with their appointment, they get a special token to put in the machine and pick their prize (there were 8-10 choices) for doing a great job.

So. Josh gets his token and with his first glance knows exactly what he wants. "Ooo, a thing for catching bugs in!!" The untrained eye might have thought he was pointing to a section full of little rings housed in those plastic bubble containers. But in (Josh's) reality, he was pointing to a section full of little plastic bubble containers for catching bugs in. Which happened to have some meaningless baubles inside them at the moment.

I didn't want him to be disappointed with his choice. I spent a minute highlighting the value and neatness of all of the other options. Bouncy ball? Spinning top? No. None of those. Once he spotted that bug catcher, he could see no other option. He was blind to all but his true desire.

I needn't have worried. Josh has been nothing but pleased with his prize. That afternoon he spent awhile wandering all through the house muttering "Where is that fly?" with his catcher open and ready for its first tenant. He found a small spider and made a few attempts to catch it but was a little too freaked out by its crawling to keep his fingers close to it for long (and opted instead to fetch a tissue for squashing it). I'm glad to have a son who has no problems defying convention and creating his own fun.