Children are completely ridiculous.  But I love them because they are so completely human.

Here's a little example for you:  Ever since the weekend before Christmas, it's become fashionable in our home to replace a high-five with a silly sort of handshake we call "Root Beer - Pizza."  It was never intended to be a long-term thing.  But one day we were enjoying lunch at Donato's, near Columbus, and we were reveling in the joys of good ol' fashioned American root beer and pizza.  Spontaneously, Elliot and I raised our glasses in a toast, putting the cups together while saying, "Root Beer!"  And then, somehow, by the end of the meal, the gesture had evolved so that no cups were included, but we'd say "Root Beer!" and then bump our fists together (fists positioned vertically, as if they were holding frosted mugs of root beer) while making an imaginary clinking sound with our mouths ("Cshhh!"), followed immediately by an exclamation of "Pizza!" -- turning our hands into small triangles, with our middle fingers as the pointy part of the "pizza slice" then touching each other in a sort of pizza-toast, while making sound with our mouths that could best be transcribed as "Psssss."  It's ludicrous, really, but it's become my kids' favorite form of tactile greeting.  So even now that we're back in Amsterdam, we're going around with this little "Root Beer!  Cshhh!  Pizza!  Psssss" routine.

I think it's hilarious.  But it's also interesting to wonder how that's really all that different from the way that any other sort of fad catches on.  You know what I mean?  "Fashion" is such a fluid concept...

Last night, when I was putting my kids to bed, I stumbled across another aspect of human nature -- specifically, the mind games that we play with ourselves that change our perception of the world.   For Elliot and Olivia, it had to do with their adjustment to jet lag.  Over the first few nights after getting back from Ohio, the kids became convinced that it was simply impossible for them to fall asleep -- that they had somehow lost the ability to sleep at night.  And while I can certainly understand the frustrations of dealing with jet-lag, it was crazy to see how the kids could whip themselves into a frenzy with their thought patterns.  On Sunday night (just before the first school day of the new year), they managed to stay up until almost midnight fussing and whining and panicking about the impossibility of falling asleep -- even though it was obvious that they were completely exhausted.  They basically just sat in their beds, tightening every muscle in their bodies, convulsing in tears and agony about how "I - just - can't - fall - asleep!"  Only when we laid down a very firm line about the consequences of any further noise coming from their room did they finally quiet themselves enough for their natural sleep impulses to take over.

So when it came time to try again yesterday (Monday evening), I thought I'd try a different tack.  After their bedtime story (during which Elliot and Olivia were already showing signs of putting up a fierce resistance to falling asleep again), I told the kids that we were going to try "The Two-Phase Sleep Plan" this time.  Phase One, I told them, would be just quiet reading for the first hour that they were in bed.  They weren't expected to fall asleep at all during this hour -- though, if they started feeling kind of sleepy, then they could of course close their eyes and let themselves fall asleep.  But then after the first hour, I would let them know when it was time for Phase Two:  putting the books aside for 15 minutes of lying quietly in bed with eyes closed.  And if they were still awake when I came to check on them at the end of Phase Two, then we would go back to Phase One -- alternating between the two phases for 15 minutes at a time as long as necessary until they finally fell asleep.  I figured it would take the pressure of them, so they could just focus on one step at a time -- not pressed by the "infinity" of time that that whole night ahead of them might overwhelm them.  Well, as you might have guessed, Olivia was asleep within the first hour, before we ever got to Phase Two.  And Elliot didn't make it out of the first iteration of Phase Two.  I simply marveled at the simplicity and quiet of it all.  Sunday evening's bedtime and Monday evening's bedtime could hardly have been more different from each other.  It was awesome.

But it all goes to show how we can so easily psyche ourselves out into manufacturing our own worst nightmares by obsessing over them.  But if we just live by faith, taking things one step at a time, things go so much more smoothly.  Like I said, children are ridiculous.  But it's not because they're children.  It's because they're human.