Floods and Forgetfulness

"Hey mom," Etienne whispered in my ear as I was nursing the baby. "James doesn't want me to tell you this, but there is a flood in the bathroom."
"What buddy?" I reply distractedly.
(A little more loudly) "I am not supposed to tell you that there is a flood in the bathroom."
"A flood?! James? What's going on son?"

Silence from the bathroom region of the house.
I hear no water, I see no water, so I don't feel there is a dire emergency and consequently get sidetracked and forget all about it.

Later, as I encounter a soaking wet mountain on top of the washer, consisting of every rag and towel in the house, I remember Etienne's words. I open the bathroom door, dreading to find the aforementioned flood and am confronted with a spotlessly clean and dry chamber. I consider accosting James with a crime, but then realize that even if he did spill water, he knew he had made a mistake and cleaned it all up. Why drag up the issue? Frankly, I was rejoiced to see what a thorough clean up he had done- minus washing every towel and rag he had used to do it. I started the laundry and went merrily on my way, thinking of how much James was growing up, and how much progress he had made. I even praised him to Steve that night when he got home.

Imagine my chagrin then, when it was time to go to bed. I pulled open the right drawer of my bathroom cabinet, searching for my glasses when my legs were promptly deluged with a wave of water from said drawer. The entire thing was full of H2O and everything in it, swimming.





After staring confusedly at the drawer for a moment, I remembered the flood I thought had been cleaned up. I just had to laugh, and started removing everything from the drawer to the counter top to dry. I left the drawer upside down to drip in the tub and went to bed, thinking that perhaps we still had a little more progress to make with James, ie. checking more thoroughly to make sure a job was done.
The next morning, I went into the bathroom and noticed there was a lot more stuff drying on the counter top than I remembered setting out the night before. I couldn't figure it out until I realized the second drawer of the cabinet was also drip-drying in the tub. Steve confessed to having had a similar bedtime experience, only with the second drawer. I hadn't even thought to check that one.
So all my projected lectures to James on being more thorough were starting to sound pretty feeble. To top it all, when I opened the washer a few minutes later, I discovered I had forgotten to put all the rags and towels in the drier. The resulting mildewy mess had to be washed all over again. Think I should give the kid a break? Perhaps he comes by it naturally.