Level Three. Responsible Me?

Level Three. Responsible Me?

By Michelle Lloyd.

When Lana, New One’s dog had arrived to live with them there had been an awful lot of the private chats between his M and D. In fact as New One expressed it, the dog was probably the it in the hushed conversations between the mum and dad because it sounded like his experience of responsibility depended on it.

RV, New One’s friend, had not been convinced that he could ever have a dog but recently there had been a lot of familiar responsibility chats in his family. The question of a pet was at the heart of all the hubbub but with New One himself not able to think of anything else despite all the swivel action in the chair he felt nothing but a bit sick by the rotating movement, and so the dog idea was accepted as a real possibility.

A dog. RV loved Lana but did he want a dog of his own. What’s it to be? R V asked himself to have a dog in his life or not. He loved dogs but he knew that they did involve a lot of work. That word of RESPONSIBILITY loomed up before RV’s eyes yet again.

That evening as he studied his Mum and Dad he watched them talking in an odd way with each other. They were standing too close, talking quietly and then when RV could take it no longer he saw something that decided it all for him, the knowing look went from Dad to Mum and out came his protest that a dog for him at his point in his life was out of the question. It was to both shocked parents RV quickly went on with his prepared outburst of a speech. He did not want to upset them but he was sure that they had not thought this all through, there was all the squeaky toys they would need, they didn’t even have a lead and all the fuss that a life with a dog may entail. At the end of the day he felt that he had Lana, his friend’s dog, already in his life and whenever he needed to he could help out with her.

It was at that point in the proceedings that RV’s Mum and Dad did the worrying and highly suspicious look thing once again and just as he thought he had made his views on the matter all clear and put an end to all the oddness that had been an issue in the household for so long, his Mum asked his Dad to tell him the news.

A baby. RV had felt as if he had been hit by his favourite toy truck. Several times! A brother? A sister? Or both? He had a friend at school who had twin siblings and he had even heard of some people having three. RV had looked at his parents, he had felt shock, anger and then because he was unsure, he did the only thing he could, cry.

In his room RV looked at the tiny picture of a wriggly, little something and tried to think of that as his potential brother/sister. It was difficult. If you half closed your eyes then the odd picture looked like a misshapen toy.

RV’s Mum had explained to him that they had known for a little while but that they had been trying to prepare him before they told him about it. RV had not been sure about any of it. He was not against babies, he understood why someone may like them but he was not an individual who liked shocks. He had difficulty with accepting new ideas and that had been a very new idea. It had taken time to adjust, a few months of getting used to it and then a further while to accept that responsibility had a few up sides and rewards. Being an older sibling was everything like RV had thought and simultaneously nothing like he had believed and ultimately he felt like it was the most emotive experience that he had ever been involved in.