Nanoseconds

One nanosecond is the same as one billionth of a second. One nanosecond is also the same as the time it takes my boys to realize that I am laying in the hammock, relaxing peacefully in the sun on a gorgeous day and quickly turn my gentle swaying into an event that would make any amusement park ride envious.

And I did have a few minutes peace on that hammock with one of the boys. But when the other boy realized what we were doing, it was as if he felt a disturbance in the force and immediately was drawn to our location where his presence was like throwing water on an alkali metal and our peace exploded into lunacy.

Jack tried his hardest to flip the hammock over with Luke and me on it but I managed to keep us upright. I also managed to keep myself out of the mud, which was no easy feat. Did you know that you can experience motion sickness on a hammock? If you’re pushed hard enough for long enough, you can. Jack did succeed in almost making me barf, which he found very hilarious and that made up for the fact that he wasn’t able to throw me from the hammock despite his best efforts.

When this hammock “fun” had gone on for what felt to me like an hour but was probably only around 20 minutes, I figured it was time to stop while we were ahead and no one was crying. Jack hadn’t gotten strangled by the strings of the hammock or impaled by the wood frame. Luke hadn’t fallen out and landed on his head. The boys weren’t mad at each other. A successful 20 minutes of fun.

“O.K. guys, that’s enough of that game. Jump on Jack and swing with us until we stop and we’ll do something else.” I need to learn that I am taken so literally around here. My eyes widened with horror as I watched him run and leap into the air as the hammock was in mid-swing. And he landed right on my belly and head. And he broke down in a fit of laughter. Had I not been laughing so hard, I probably would have cried. So much for stopping before someone got hurt.

“I think you killed me. Let’s get off this thing and go throw water balloons at each other’s heads.”

And so we moved onto another one of our favorite, harmless activities.

P.S. It takes about 15 seconds to fill one water balloon and tie it. It takes one nanosecond to throw it.