My Dream (Lego) House

Never in a million years did I think I'd be spending a Sunday watching my dreamhouse become a reality.

It had five bedrooms and a playroom. The entryway opened into the kitchen. That way, any casual visitor could see that we stored our air compressor, toy dinosaurs and prehistoric sea creature experiments on our kitchen counter.

Then, just as the last red brick was being laid...

"Oh. You're using all the red legos?" Johnny asked, mildly disappointed. "I need some for my spaceships."

"Well, I need them for my house," I said.

What was I saying?

I'm the grownup. I'm supposed to share. Anyway, white legos might look better for the interior walls...

"Here, honey," I said, pulling apart red walls. "You're welcome to whatever legos you need."

After Johnny finished his eight identical spaceships, he smiled at me again.

"Now I'm going to make trains," he said. "I need the blue legos."

"Okay," I said, eyeing the exterior of my new home, which was blue.

"We need to destroy the house," he said.

There went my dream house. And to make matters worse, I became Johnny's assistant. I had to use the legos from my own shattered dream to build a train for a micromanager.

Knowing how attuned to detail Johnny is, I copied his lego train exactly.

"Actually, you need to make your own plan," he said, as nicely as he could. "You can't copy mine."

So I made my train red and yellow.

"Um," he laughed awkwardly. "I didn't say it should be red."

You know when you're helping someone and she tells you to do it differently?

Say you're helping your elderly neighbor paint her garage.

At first, she's like, "Oh, I actually don't want the paint rolled on because it will drip onto my prize-winning azalias.

And you're like, "Oh, that's a good point. I'll use a brush."

And then she says, "Um. I usually paint at a slight angle. I think we should paint the same way."

And you think, "Okay. That doesn't make sense, but whatever."

And then she's like, "Um, would you mind not dripping the paint on the outside of the paint can?"

Well, that's how I felt with the legos.

Nevertheless, I took them apart and started over using blue and yellow.

Then, to drive Johnny crazy, I connected the five trains into a double wide, double decker train.

"It's one big train," he said.

"Yes," I said defiantly.

"I like it," he said.

At that point, I knew I was dreaming.

However, I noticed that when Johnny brought the spaceships and trains downstairs to show his dad, my train got left upstairs.

That's okay. My specialty is designing fantasy lego houses, not imaginary trains.