The Joys Of Mannyhood

‘FIRST I KILL OLMO, THEN WE PLAY SNAP!’

Surely siblings should have some natural bond that makes them want to appreciate the others company and grow up in some form of hippy fuelled harmony of peace love and happiness where they spend the whole of their lives living in tranquillity, without the incessant desire to pinch, scratch, punch, kick, bite, strangle the respective brother or sister. Apparently not.

Daniele seems to think we should get an exorcist for Elisa, the reason being is that Elisa seems to think that ‘Elisa please be nicer to Olmo’ actually means: ‘Go on, kick him a bit harder. You can tell he’s enjoying you kicking him from his screams of pleasure and the stream of blood running from his nose.’ In Olmo’s defence it’s not like he deserves the amount of abuse he receives. He’s just one of those children that has spends more time with his face on the floor than his own two feet. Literally everything he does or touches manages to end with some form of calamity. Yesterday when searching for his coin collection through his drawers, he somehow pulled the full draw out of the dresser consequently spilling his collection of over 200 coins on the floor.

“Olmo you know you really are very special.”

“Special? Why?”

“Well anything you do, you manage to injure yourself, someone else or break the closest thing to you.”

“No.”

About a millisecond after stating ‘no’, Olmo decides to vault both me and Elisa and lands feet first on Elisa’s fingers.

My personal philosophy is no blood, no bones protruding out of your skin, then no
reason to cry. Of course this isn’t easily explained to a seven year old that doesn’t speak the same language as you which leaves you with the only feasible resolution as bribery. So far slabs of chocolate are the most popular choice of bribery, second place goes to chocolate croissants and thirdly we have lemonade. My parenting technique is obviously one to be admired. If I truly had my own way I would just let them fight it to the death, maybe even with sticks. Daniele agrees with this parenting method. Please remind me why I’m looking after children.

Daniele also seems to think that we should sell Elisa, preferably to some rich Saudis where we could either get some money for her, or some camels. He’d like a camel for the back garden. The reason for this is ‘she’s a bitch, and I hate her.’ On occasions this viewpoint is almost understandable. Yesterday Elisa realised that she was bound to the Spanish education system for the next ten years and that she certainly did not like the concept of this idea. This then means that she employs the ‘I’m going to cry until I get what I want approach.’ Unfortunately for Elisa, her seven her old capacity hasn’t fully comprehended that in this case that probably won’t work. This also means that as she won’t get what she wants, she won’t stop crying. Unfortunately for me, Elisa has the lungs of a drill sergeant and I was woken up at 7.30. Waking up at 7.30 equals unhappy au pair.