I had to pee. It was a sweet relief, as I had been making an effort to drink more water and my bladder was burgeoning. I turned to grab some toilet paper and was greeted by what was essentially an empty roll, with three shredded strips barely clinging to the cardboard tube. Yep, my husband Toby had used the bathroom last. This was his gift to me.
What can I say? I married a toddler.
Don’t get me wrong; I love the big lug. And believe it or not, these little incidents just accentuate the reasons why I love him. Case in point: the empty tube of toilet paper. Toby likes to multi-task when doing anything other than working on a race car. You will rarely see him just watching TV—it’s much like when he makes a visit to the bathroom—he’ll have the iPad in his hands, watching videos of races.
Football players watch tape of their competitors before they face off, and Toby’s no different when it comes to racing. He’ll watch hours of race footage—taking note of how the machines of others are handling, and often watching his own car, piloted by Ty Majeski, formulating ideas for future set-ups.
My point here is that I’m 99.9% sure that when he finished his business in the bathroom, the empty toilet paper roll was the last thing on his mind, as he was likely deep in thought watching the video. I’m just grateful he washed his hands… at least I HOPE he washed his hands.
Again, I married a toddler.
Sometimes he’s not on the iPad while “taking care of business” on the commode. Instead he will have the phone glued to his ear, deep in conversation with someone about a race or trying to help someone dial in their car. These incidents regularly provide moments of mortification for me.
Invariably, there is a “release of the hounds” so to speak, whilst he’s seated on the throne. Doing this on what is essentially a porcelain megaphone surely makes whoever is on the other end of the phone either burst out laughing or ponder what Toby is working on while talking to them. Meanwhile, I’m literally dying in the other room, where it was completely audible as well.
I can’t make this stuff up; and his indifference toward it is another shining example of the carefree heart of a toddler.
The times I most feel like his parent thankfully don’t happen very often. It’s when we make rare plans to go and do something that has nothing to do with racing. I’ve learned to keep planning simple, like just a month or so ahead of time with him; as I did for the wedding of a close friend’s son.
I checked and double-checked with him and his race schedule before I sent in our RSVP for the blessed event. But in true Toby fashion, he informed me the week of the wedding that there was a race in Plover that was happening.
I just stared at him. He stared at me, like a precocious child. After much silence, he walked away to play with his dog. He didn’t have a driver running in this race at Plover. He just knew there was a race going on and he feels the need to be there.
It was a day later that I realized why he was needling me about going to the race, when I received a text message from a driver, who shall remain nameless, because I like him and don’t want to throw him under the bus. At any rate, he texted me asking what favors he would have to do for me to “allow Toby to go to the race” to help him.
Mind you, this was two days before the race (or wedding). Feeling like a jerk, I had to text back and explain that we had already committed to attending this wedding and there would be other opportunities for Toby to work with him this race season. I felt awful doing that.
After I hit “send,” it occurred to me that there may have been an attempt to play me.
I called Toby and asked him, “Did you put (insert driver’s name here) up to asking me about getting you to go to Plover?”
“What? I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Could the response get any more toddler-like?
After a few more tactfully angled questions, he confessed that he had indeed left the proverbial door open for this ploy to occur. Like a parent at their wit’s end, I threw my hands up and told him if he really wanted to go to the race, he might as well do so.
It was pretty quiet for a few beats, but eventually he agreed that he would follow through with his commitment to go to the wedding with me. His voice drooped as the words fell off his pouting lips.
It’s the same dejection that I feel when I’m staring at the epic stains he somehow gets on his clothes. I’ve told you about these stains before and the challenges I have removing the mystery stuff out of his crew shirts.
Once, Toby even managed to get mustard on his dog, Pudge while the two shared his lunch. I had to pick my jaw off the ground when he took his meaty index finger and swiped the yellow glob off Pudge and plunked it directly into his mouth.
If that’s not toddler behavior, I don’t know what is. 
He revels in the play time with his grandchildren, and I’m convinced it’s because he’s so fluent in their language. He took the kids for a “ride” in the cart on the back of the riding lawnmower over Easter weekend. It began to rain heavily, but rather than hurry back to the garage, he proceeded to turn donuts in the rain with the kids.
The cheers and squeals were hilarious, but were nothing compared to the big grin on the face of the toddler that I married.
Originally published in the Midwest Racing Connection
