Page 284 of The Parkers' Handsome Holiday
“I guess,” Ethan pouted. “But I’m just bored. Cody’s got the new PowerBox, plus all the coolest games like the skiing one and the army one. Why can’t I have a PowerBox?”
I fought the urge to sigh. I would never say it to Ethan or anybody else, but Cody’s parents seriously spoiled the kid. And that was fine, that was their prerogative. But sometimes I wished that Ethan wasn’t exposed to all that stuff. We lived simply, here in our little cabin. I thought this place was pretty damned close to paradise, honestly. I didn’t see why we needed all those gimmicks and things. Ethan was an imaginative kid; he could come up with ten thousand games to play, so why did he need the latest video games and all of that?
“How about this, buddy?” I asked. “We haven’t been fishing in a while.”
Ethan giggled. “Fishing’s for summertime,” he said. “All the water is frozen!”
“It might be frozen on top, but there’s water underneath,” I promised him. “It’s called ice fishing. What do you think, should we try it?” It had been forever since I’d been ice fishing. I used to go regularly, even when Ethan was young. Back then, Beth had been able to watch him for a day while Dad and I went out fishing together. But once Beth got sick, well, things had changed. I hadn’t had as much time for myself.
But fishing would get us out of the house for the day, and I was sure that Dad would be interested as well, if he wasn’t already up skiing. I had always loved fishing with Dad when I was a kid. Even though he and I didn’t have the best relationship with one another, never having been particularly close, there was something about being out on the lake that made the distance seem less between us. Socializing without having to really socialize, I guessed.
I gave Dad a call, and he was more than happy to join us for the day. He promised to bring his auger for drilling the holes, and I promised to bring camp chairs and plenty of blankets. I also threw some of the firewood in the back of my truck, much to Ethan’s delight.
“Can we toast marshmallows?” he asked excitedly.
I laughed. “The fire’s mostly to keep us warm,” I said. “But we can have a few s’mores as well.”
Ethan cheered, and I had to grin at his infectious enthusiasm. This seemed like the perfect plan for the day. We picked up Dad on the way out to the lake and arrived just as the sun was really starting to warm things up for the day. Not that it would be a particularly warm day, but the bright sunlight gleaming off the fresh snow was definitely beautiful. I was glad that I’d remembered sunglasses, though.
There were a few other people out on the lake as well, clearly having had the same idea as us. We set up a little ways away from them, lugging things out from the truck.
Of course, it wasn’t long, once we had everything set up, before Ethan was saying again that he was bored. “When are you going to catch one?” he asked, peering down into the hole.
“I don’t know, buddy,” I said. “You want to reel in the line and let it out again?”
“Okay,” Ethan sighed.
“So what’s new with you, kiddo?” Dad asked, crouching down next to Ethan and checking something on one of the other rods.
“Nothing,” Ethan said. He paused, cocking his head to the side. “My friend has the new PowerBox, though.”
“What’s a PowerBox?” Dad asked.
“It’s a video game system,” I explained, shrugging when he looked up at me. Seeing that Ethan was still engrossed with the fishing rod, I made the gesture for ‘expensive’, and Dad nodded briefly.
“It’s the best,” Ethan said. “He’s got all the cool games. I bet he never gets bored.”
Dad laughed. “Adam, maybe you need to get the boy something to do in his free time,” he said.
“He’s fine, Dad,” I said, shaking my head. “He’s got plenty of things to do. Especially with ski season starting up right now. Between that and school, it’s going to be a busy enough winter. Besides, we don’t need all that fancy technology that they have now. It just makes people lazy.”
I was actually surprised that he had said anything to me about it in the first place. We lived in the only two homes in our area, and cell service at the houses was spotty most times. Neither of us had cable, and I was pretty sure that Dad still had the old TV that we had had when I was a kid. He had a computer, but it was also outdated and slow. He wasn’t exactly with the times, himself.
Still, he shook his head. “You just can’t think of video games without thinking about Beth, that’s all,” he said, and I felt my eyes widen in surprise. He seemed to immediately regret what he had said, but his eyes turned towards Ethan instead of me. Ethan gave no sign of listening, though. Instead, he was shoving snow down the hole in the ice and watching it melt and disappear.
And it was true. When I thought about video games, I thought about Beth sitting there in the hospital with her tablet on her lap, doing anything to make the hours pass a little faster. Towards the end, she had been waiting anxiously to go, to leave behind this world of pain. I knew that she wasn’t looking forward to leaving Ethan and I behind, only that she had to do whatever she could to accept the fact that the diagnosis was terminal. But that hadn’t made it any easier.
Still, there was no reason for Ethan to have the latest and greatest when it came to technology. He was still young. I wanted to raise him right. I wanted to raise him thinking and imagining for himself. Books instead of video games, at least for the most part. There had been plenty of studies done to show that limiting screen time for kids would help them as they grew up. Dad had to know that.
“Well, I don’t think there’s any harm in letting the boy play some games,” Dad said gruffly. He clapped his hand on Ethan’s shoulder. “Christmas isn’t that far away,” he said significantly, and Ethan’s face broke out into a huge smile.
I fought the urge to roll my eyes, but I knew that it would be fighting a losing battle. I’d just have to make sure that if Dad got him some gaming system for Christmas, we went over the rules for it before it was even out of the box. Same as with TV, he would get a limited amount of time per week that he could use. And the amount of time would be based around what chores he did for the week, I decided.
It was funny, the way that Dad had taken such a shine to Ethan. He had never been like that with me. If I had been a kid still, I sincerely doubted that I would have received any sort of gaming system for Christmas. All the gifts that I could remember getting from my parents had been utilitarian; things like socks and sweaters, logic puzzles, ski gear. Very practical, and nothing too flashy. Hell, I could still remember the first time I had gotten a brand new pair of skis. I had been well into my teens by that point, and the only reason I got them was because I worked hard, saved my money, and paid for half of the pair by myself.
But I bit my tongue before I said anything. I liked that Dad wanted to spoil Ethan and bond with him in a way that he never had with me. Not only that but I knew exactly what Dad would say in response if I mentioned anything about spoiling my son; Ethan was a good kid, and good kids deserved rewards sometimes. That was the same work ethic that he had always taught me.
Anyway, maybe it would be a good thing for Ethan to have a gaming system. Something else for him to amuse himself with while I toiled away around the house. I loved the kid, but it would be nice if I could get a little time to myself sometimes. Or time with…
