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Today while tending to chores around my house and watching my two-year-old grandson, I left him in his mini-rocker with a sippy cup of milk while I went to start the washer.  I added my detergent, loaded the remnants of the interrupted load into the washer and headed back to the kitchen.  I couldn't find the boy right away, but noticed that one of my three schnauzers seemed awfully confused. 

"Where's Harry?" I asked.  Unable to respond with words, Cmdr. Woofenstein did his usual round of circles adding to the canine king of confusion look. 

'He-yi-yam, Gamaw" I heard from just behind me.  I turned and saw the little rascal seated on the fresh rugs I'd just layered in Cmdr.'s crate, his milk bottle resting against his knee, a smile as sweet as any I've ever seen stretched proudly across his face, his tow headed handsomeness bright against the black grid of the crate. "Harry's got a dog room," he proclaimed as if it was the brightest adventure of his day.

"Oh, Harry, wait right there; I'll be right back," I said as I scurried off to grab my camera for the perfectly silly photo op.  I needn't have hurried, though.  Harry was more than content to be in Cmdr.'s space, though Cmdr. wasn't exactly convinced it was a good idea.  I took a series of pictures to show off the adorable antics to my daughter when she returned from her chores.  She always asked what we'd done with our time together any time she came to pick Harry up.

I reviewed the images while Harry downed his milk, and even when the phone rang, I snapped one more shot of Harry's face as he peered through the grid of the black crate's door he'd pulled shut on himself.  "You're trapped!" I said to him over my shoulder, giggling and enjoying the novelty of a boy in a crate as much as Harry was.  I zipped off to grab my ringing cell phone and answered just before I ran out of time.

"Hi, Honey" I chirped into the phone. "Harry's got a dog room," I continued while thinking how that must have sounded to her.  "And come to think of it, I might just have snapped the pictures that could get me put away for life," I said a bit more sedately.  

My daughter laughed and I realized I was a bit over the top to give that idea much more room for growth, but still, my head reached out to visit all the possibilities and how in today's world the horrible things people were doing to children, other's and their own, had gotten vast amounts of public attention and media coverage.

I held the camera in my right hand, cradled the phone in my left hand toying with the idea of deleting the images I'd just recorded.  The Grandma in me won out over the practical person that still fears incarceration more than any other possible problem life may bring my way.  Grandma decided to keep the pictures, and the more level headed me chose to tell the world what I've done and ask for understanding.

After all, what's cuter than a kid in a crate?