King of Potchky

April 2, 2012

I live with the King of Potchky. It’s almost as if at the slightest mention of moving his body faster, his body inadvertently (or extremely purposely as the case may be) starts moving even slower! In case you are unfamiliar with the word potchky, it is a yiddish word that has always meant something similar to dilly dally in my family. Wiktionary, however, says that it means to work in an amateur fashion for little gain or to tinker.

Its no surprise that my three and a half year old is an expert dilly dallier but the fact that it gets even worse in a morning full of chaos makes for a very unhappy mom. Coupled with the fact that Gabby chooses then to pull out every toy under the sun or take off all the clothes and shoes I just put on her, doesn’t help the situation.

For the short while when I was seeing the social worker about the problems Drew and I were going through, we talked about the morning frequently being the low point starting off the day. She led me down the road towards the ultimate question of what would happen if we were, dare I say, late? If Drew being the King of Potchky resulted in us arriving late to school, what would happen?

Clearly that’s happened a time or two and yet I still am alive to write about the tale. Surely it doesn’t set Drew up for success when he’s absent for the beginning of his morning routine at school. It definitely doesn’t make for a happy mom if she arrives late to her morning exercise class. But the world will not end, yet I make myself absolutely crazy trying to get out of the house.

So what is the answer? Obviously if I could put it in its proper perspective and calmly get both my children into the car in leisurely fashion we will all benefit from that. How is that possible when I send the king upstairs for one small thing and he ends up meandering for fifteen minutes and not accomplishing anything? How am I supposed to maintain composure when shoes aren’t put on upon request, books have been taken out and coats are still on their hooks? How do I happily co-exist with the King of Potchky? And how do I handle that he’s training his sister in his ways and she seems to be a quick learn?

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