Dad’s world with Jonathan deBurca Butler

EDUCATION has its risks. I found this out, to my detriment, the other evening, when a routine lesson in biology went slightly awry.

On my return from work, I was met by the regular, greeting posse. As usual, Fionn was straight in there with his excited requests to do this, that, and the other and, as is the norm, Luke was in the arms of our overworked and under-paid au pair.

As she passed my youngest over to me, we tried to initiate a conversation centred on what had been going on during the day.

Fionn continued to jump up and down, but Luke was surprisingly quiet and I noted, out of the corner of my eye, that he was staring at me. It was a little odd, but I thought little of it.

Not a second later and our little patter was interrupted by a slow and knowledgeable declaration from Luke’s tiny little mouth.

“Eeeeeeeeyyyyyeeeezzzzzz,” he says like a mini Yoda, proceeding to remind me where one of them is, by poking my eyeball with his finger.

“Ouch,” I exclaimed, which only galvanised the terror and he raised the offending digit towards the other eye. I managed to stop him.

“Oh, yeah,” said our au pair, looking at me with a small dose of sympathy, but a bigger dose of giggling, “we’ve been learning about that today.”

“Noooooodddddeeeee,”says Luke, prodding my rather large nose with his finger.

He returned to his own nose and gave it a great big squish.

There is nothing better than seeing your child pass those little milestones: the pincer grip, those first few steps, holding a spoon.

All that stuff is great, but I wonder do we realise that when they learn to do these things, they are actually learning independence, which means not doing exactly what you want them to do?

Take the spoon thing, for example. When Luke started learning to use it, it was like carnival in Rio de Janiero. Mum and Dad danced around the kitchen and nearly patted his baldy little head off with the praise and excitement.

Several months later, and having had a restaurant’s worth of food catapulted at us, we now wonder if we started him too young; well, we don’t really, but you get what I mean.

As for Fionn, let’s just say that monasteries are becoming a serious option. This guy is too clever.

I’ve already spoken about his vocabulary and how he corrects us when we’re reading him stories, but recently he’s entered a new phase of development — tactics.

Alex Ferguson, Jose Mourinho and Joel Schmidt have nothing on this little Machiavellian.

Fionn learnt how to use the potty fairly quickly. It took him a while to get there, but when he did he was done with the whole thing within a week.

He was now a big boy and he wanted to play, or at least pee, with the big boys. He was quickly promoted to the premier toilet and he hasn’t looked back since.

Indeed, such is his control over his bowel movements that he can time a number two to perfection. And that time is usually just before the last story before bedtime.

It’s a killer. Just as your long day is about to wind down, and you’re dreaming of sitting on the couch and having that precious hour to yourself, he announces, without even trying to hide his smile, that he needs a poo. You have no choice.

Up you get, off with the pull-ups, and in you march to sit there staring at each other across the bathroom; he trying to hold in his laughter, you trying to hold in your frustration. He has it down to a fine art.

A wise man once said that with knowledge comes great power. It would appear that parents still haven’t learnt that.