I wouldn't eat that if I were you

"All the art of living lies in a fine mingling of letting go and holding on." - Havelock Ellis

Little fingers find the littlest trinkets and treasures.  Little mouths, like vacuous black holes, absorb everything those little fingers find.

My 11-month-old discovered an eraser today, a half-inch cube.  From where I do not know.  The level of his eyes introduces him to a world few walking erectly ever see.

Our eyes locked.

He smiled proudly.

I shook my head and lunged toward him, narrowly dodging the blocks, books, and bears scattered across the floor.

My old-man grunts were drowned out by his mocking laughter as he pushed the eraser in his mouth at Usain Bolt speed.

My arms thwarted his attempted escape and I quickly rolled him over and plunged my finger into his swimming pool of a mouth.

His laughter stopped when I successfully extracted the eraser and he gave me an "oh no, you di'n't" look.

Then the tears.  Oh the tears.

I just saved your life, young man!  And this is how you thank me?  With a tantrum?

You could have choked on this eraser and --

-- um --

-- wait a sec --

That's not an eraser.

It's cheese.

When was the last time we had cheese in the living room?  Couple weeks?  Month?

This cube of cheese was a little harder than an eraser.  Full of hair, dust, and probably enough microbials to give even the strongest of digestive tracks a good flush.  Pun intended.  Duh.

I had the disease-cheese safely contained, but baby boy wanted it back.

In his mouth.

And then in his stomach.

"Don't you get it?"  I wondered rhetorically.  "This is bad for you.  I took it away for your own good."

Cue the painfully obvious parallel.

How much month-old cheese am I still clinging to?  Why do I continually throw tantrums when God does His best to rid me of the intestine attacking milk curds?  It's for my own good!

I'm getting better.  Gradually.  Like a fine aged cheddar.

The less I whine over other actors getting roles for which I felt I was more qualified, the more roles I tend to get.  The less I sulk at another producer's connection to financiers, the more connections pop up for me.  The more I applaud others' fortunes and accomplishments, the more fortunes and accomplishments seem to come my way.

I'm getting better at letting the hard hairy cheese go and just living with the cheesiness of my parables, metaphors, and allegories.

But it's a process.  Like Velveeta.

And yes, Chad, I used the word "erectly".