“When we move, can we move somewhere warm?” the boy asked last night. I thought he meant the house itself. I’ve been lazy as tender of the fire and the house has been cold from time to time.
“Sure. It’ll be warm. Don’t worry.”
“Like Arkansas or Florida or California or someplace like that?” he adds, and now I know what he’s getting at. Somewhere, as in somewhere else.
“Is it warm in Minnesota?”
“Warm and cold,” I say. “And don’t forget about the mosquitoes I told you about. Swarms of them. Swarms so thick they carry off most of the smaller children if they’re left outside unprotected.”
“Dad, I’m serious.”
“Okay, I’m sorry, that was an exaggeration. Children aren’t carried away by mosquitoes, but they do freeze to death in the winter. Lots of them. Hundreds, maybe thousands, but it’s not all bad because of the ice fishing. Frozen kids make great bait. Northerns, I think.”
“Dad....”
“Maybe large-mouth bass, I can’t remember. I’m not much of a fisherman.”
“Dad!”
“And can you blame me? Baiting a hook with a little frozen kid, it’s kind of gross.”
The boy finally loses interest in my nonsense and goes back to playing music, telling me an endless stream of information that is almost easy to ignore.
“I have five different versions of Who Let The Dogs Out,” I hear him say. He sings a couple of other variations, then asks me the time. “What time is it exactly?” I tell him, for about the fourth time this morning already. “Exactly, Dad. I need to know exactly.” I tell him.
“Is that exactly?”
“Yes.”
“What time is it.... NOW?” I tell him, but he’s asked now so many times that the time has actually changed. I start to worry that we’ll spend the next 60 minutes this way, getting nowhere.
“I’m trying to set my iPod, Dad. I need to know exact.” He breaks into yet another version of Who Let The Dogs Out and I think, maybe we will move to Minnesota. I could tolerate the mosquitoes, and besides, my son would catch one whopper of a bass.