Master J, Destroyer of the Universe

Okay, first of all, he's just fine. The child was not harmed as a result of this incident. He should have been. Because while Mister C & I were inside our home talking with a real estate agent about the future sale of our home, Master J was outside, devaluing it. Master J spent the majority of his afternoon outside climbing our big pine tree and chasing ADHD Girl around. Standard operating procedure for a nice afternoon. He came in for dinner and then immediately went back out to continue playing. I'm totally all about the being outside thing. It makes my house less chaotic, especially when he takes ADHD Girl out with him. It also makes my evening much more pleasant since they both tend to sleep better when they finally do come back in the house. The real estate agent arrived around 6:00 and the three adults then sat down at the kitchen table to start discussing. Master J was jumping off of a piece of furniture onto the deck at first and I asked him to stop because it was sort of annoying. I should have left him at it because at least then I would know what he was doing. About 15 minutes later I realized that it was a little quiet so I excused myself from the conversation and went to check on him. He was sitting on one of the chairs, with his foot braced against one of the spindles on the deck railing, and he was pulling with all his might on the top part of the spindle. And the spindle, was broken. In half. To say I was angry would be an understatement. That I couldn't mention what had happened out loud did not in any way dissipate that anger. So I did the classic "speaking through clenched teeth" thing and sent him to his room. Then I had to come back into the house and act like everything was fine while silently fuming inside. Honestly, the time lapse was probably his saving grace. When the agent left, I went upstairs to send Master J to bed. When I left his room, after discussing the incident, he was sobbing because he did not know why he had done it. Mister C went up to say goodnight to him about 15 minutes later and came down to tell me that Master J was still up there sobbing. I didn't go up. I finally did go up about 30 minutes later to give him a hug and he was still sniffling at that point. He apologized for "tearing up the house, again." and then told me that "Dad was nicer about it than you." Apparently all Mister C told him was to "try" and not destroy anything else and he promised he would try. Guess I got to be the bad cop this time.