The Keymaster

Our kid was determined. He wanted to get inside his room, and it didn't matter to him who was in there. My mother claimed she was using the room to get dressed, but Kyle seemed to think she was in there for other reasons. The little guy knows what the deal is with his room. He knows by heart what treasures lie behind that door. There was no way he was going to believe that "I'm getting changed" story for one minute. No doubt he was expecting to barge in there and find his Memere (that's what we of French-Canadian ancestry call our grandmothers) singing the ABC's with his musical toy table, racing trains across the floor, or wading in the secret swimming pool. Kyle had no problem with his Memere using his toys. But keeping Kyle outside the room as she played? Well, that goes against the rules of sharing, and Kyle would have none of that.

At first, Kyle tried to get in the polite way. He knocked, and my mom knocked back. Kyle tried again, and again my mom knocked back. Kyle laughed, but you could tell he was infuriated that this was going nowhere. After a dozen or so more knocks and giggles, our son did something he never did before. He ran from the door towards me and shouted, "KEYS! KEYS! KEYS!"

Kyle received his own set of keys about a year ago. Before then, we had to be careful carrying Kyle past our own keys, as he would reach out and grab them, often smacking us in the face or neck along the way. We didn't want Kyle playing with our keys, as we were concerned he might put them in his mouth or start up the car. So, we bought him a ring of his own and put them next to ours. Whenever Kyle went for our keys, we gave him his. Soon he stopped wanting ours, and just took his whenever he could, often smacking us in the face or neck along the way. It was a much better situation. Little did I know that he thought his keys were just as real as ours. That all became clear yesterday morning.

"KEYS! KEYS! KEYS!" Kyle shouted. I grabbed his keys off the hook and handed them to him.

The little guy quickly spun around and ran back to the door. He took one key from the loop and started pressing it on the doorknob, hoping the key would go in even though it's twice the size of the key hole. After trying for a half-minute or so, he would pull the keys down, fumble through them, and try the doorknob again with another key. As he went on and on, trying each key, you could hear him muttering under his breath, "No, this key must be for the car. This is the front door key. This one belongs to the safe. What's this key doing here? Do I still even own whatever it opens?" Again, Kyle was going nowhere fast. Too bad he never realized that the door wasn't even locked.

Five minutes later, the door opened, and my mom walked out of the room wearing different clothes. She clearly had been changing and not playing with his toys, but Kyle remains suspicious of her.

My parents and I were amused by what had just happened, though I was a little concerned about Kyle's determination to get that door open. I recalled that scene in Jurassic Park when one of the scientists says they'll be safe unless the man-eating dinosaurs figured out how to open doors... and then the next scene shows a dinosaur doing just that. Kyle has yet to learn how to turn a doorknob to get a door open, but the incident yesterday shows that he's determined to figure it out. If he does, we could be in for some trouble. I would have to get better locks for the doors, do more baby-proofing, and remodel our room of rotating knives. If anything, I no longer would be able to shut myself in Kyle's room to play with all his toys. And that would be a sad day indeed.