Saturday, May 02, 2015

Where Imaginary Friends Go To Die

Sad news at breakfast earlier - my 4YO told the family that his imaginary friend of nearly 3 years had died the previous night while riding a tiger in Tijuana.

After telling us the gloomy news, he went about finishing his Frosted Mini Wheat’s while watching Woody Woodpecker on Netflix with his sister. Obviously, to say the least, the rest of us were more shocked by the news than he was.

I can genuinely say I’ll miss the 1’ 6” little guy.

Sneaky Gumball loved living life on the edge of mischief and danger since his appearance in 2012 when our son was about 2 1/2. I still remember the day he came into our home instantly appearing when our son was standing near spilled juice on the family room rug. When we had asked, “did you spill this?” he replied with, “I didn’t do it, Sneaky Gumball did it.”

Sneaky Gumball did all sorts of bad things. He stole French fries, lost Lego’s, threw balls indoors, broke toys, farted in closed cars while driving through the car wash and elevators; he even managed to steal our son’s pull-up at night, pee in it, and put it right back on him. Sneaky that Gumball was. 

In addition, Sneaky Gumball's parents had made lots of questionable life decisions as they let him do dangerous things our son was never allowed to do. For example: when our son wanted to light matches for a bonfire and we refused, he would instantly respond with, “well, Sneaky Gumball’s parents let him play with matches…all the time.”
The conversation never ends well when your parenting choices are compared to that of some other “cool parents.”

Well obviously riding tigers in places lacking authority was not an entirely shocking ending. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if Sneaky Gumball’s parents bought him that tiger for his 5th birthday and left him alone at his parents Tijuana timeshare.

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