The littlest WideEyedFunk was holding his head in his hands when I saw him in the living room. Spent, frustrated, and angry, he stared at his new bike helmet laying on the floor. It looked like a lumpy neon-green billiard ball.

“What’s happening there?” I asked him. I felt like a giant standing over him. I was crunching on a snack and idling away an afternoon. I’m used to small beings around the WideEyedHouse, but usually they are dogs and cats of limited sentience. How interesting to be able to talk to a small one and expect a real, human-language response.

He sighed.

Ok, well, that was sort of Hamish-the-Corgi like in nature.

“No really,” I persisted despite his terrible angst. “What’s wrong?”

The small one looked up at me and ran his hands over his head. “I can’t get my bike helmet to fit.” He put it on his head. Backwards. He was correct. It did not fit. The straps dangled in the wrong place, his ears were being pushed awkwardly, and it came down over his eyes.

I crunched my snack for moment, having a good look at the situation. He waggled his head around and the helmet plopped into his lap. I saw that there were two air vents in the front and four in the back.

“How many eyes do you have on the front of your head?” I asked him. He was intrigued and put his hands over them. “Two,” he giggled about my obvious lackwittedness.

“Uh huh. How many eyes do you have on the back of your head?” Now the small WideEyedFunk was totally focused. He put his hands on the back of his head and looked at me, all wide-eyed with his two front ones.

“Four, right?” I said it like it was an obvious fact. He nodded, yep, he could feel them back there for the first time.

“Match the holes in your helmet to the eyes in your head – two in the front, four in the back.”

I watched the small one inspect his helmet and count the vent holes. He held it up over his head, double checked the eyes to vents match up and plonked it down. He smiled. Problem solved.