My toys visit Basil

The only response to the e-mail I received was to say, “Me and my toys are on our way.”
The e-mail from my daughter-in-love said, “Basil insisted that we go see Grandma. He has been asking me for months. I guess he finally lost patience because he sat himself down on the 2 foot high later and said, ‘I will sit here and wait until we go to Grandma’s house.’ I said, ‘Basil, that won’t be until Thanksgiving.’ He ignored me and just sat there with his arms crossed. He really wants to play with the remote-control cars.”
Fortunately, I had already decided a visit was long overdue. After I pulled out the remote control car, I called and told him I was coming. He asked if I could also bring the toy typewriter as well.
If he could not go to the toys, the toys would go to him.
Before I got there, he only asked his mother a zillion times, “is grandma bringing the remote control truck and car?” Assured that I was, he went to bed. When he woke up in the morning, there I was, and his first question to me was, “did you bring your remote control truck with you?”
I told him, “Yes, now say, ‘Hi grandma’ and then we will go get it, okay?”
He said ‘hi,’ and waited impatiently for me to pull out the remote control truck.
We didn’t see much of him for the next couple hours.
The granddaughters and I went to a garage sale or two and bought a lot more books. We made cookies. We checked out all the new cupboards that my husband built. By evening the toys had been discarded. As I read one of my new books, my grandson came and said, “Grandma, you go home now. You come back in the morning, but you go home now.”
His mother was aghast, but I understood perfectly – I had thought the very same thing right in the middle of the last minute everything for my daughter’s wedding. I really wanted to say, “Okay, ya’ll go home now. Come back in the morning, but go home now.” After inviting everyone to come, and months of lovingly planning and cooking meals to serve my guests, shopping for welcoming gifts and planning a place for everyone to sleep, suddenly I was very tired, just like Basil. I just wanted them all to go home – now.
But, I also definitely wanted them to be there the next day to do wedding stuff. Of course, no one could go home, it was too far, just as it was too far to leave the grandchildren’s home and go home for the night.
So we stayed, went to our separate rooms to sleep and felt much better in the morning. My grandson ignored the remote control truck and checked out the tractor I had brought. We ate pancakes for breakfast and his mother showed off just how convenient the new counter is with the bar stools where all the children can be fed as she cooks on the other side of the counter top. The oldest granddaughter slapped me affectionately on my back as we sat down together, “Grandma, ole’ buddy, ole’ buddy old pal.” Her ole, buddy ole pal showed her how to make jelly rolls out of her pancakes.
Little sister sat on my other side licking the peanut butter off from her pancake before she smiled every so sweetly and wanted me to refill it with peanut butter. I added peanut butter and jam, sliced up her pancakes and talked like a buffoon to her, as I speared bites of peanut butter and jam covered pancake with a fork. She took the fork away from me and fed herself.
We had a good ole’ buddy time together while their brother quietly ate his pancakes and kept his distance. That’s okay, I know, he’ll be calling the next time he wants to play with my remote control cars.