Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Teenage Mutan..

Oh! Sorry. You caught me. I’ve had that silly song stuck in my head for the past few days. Ever since I began helping Brendan with the task of painting his room in a Ninja Turtles theme. To a four-year-old, a green, purple, red, and orange room ‘rocks,’ in his words. To a Papa, it’s the next thing to experiencing the agonies Michelangelo experienced painting the ceiling of the Sistine chapel.

“Pa, I want a red ceiling with green walls, and maybe purple stripes in the corner with orange around the top!”

“Given this a lot of thought haven’t you, pal?” I asked with a smile.

“Yes, Pa! This is my room, and Mommy said I could paint it if you would help me. Will you help me, Pa? Pleaaseee.”

He’s a hard man to turn down. “Sure buddy, I’ll help you.” The smile on his face was almost worth the task before us.

I explained to my daughter that I had no intention of painting his room. I wanted him to paint it. I would be in charge of drop-clothes and cleanup. Both Brendan’s and his floor. I had already gathered a few cut off broomsticks to put his rollers on so he could reach as high as he could as he painted. I’d help him with the high stuff, mostly I’d do the corners so it would be neat, but I wanted him to actually get to paint his own room! How many four-year-olds get to do something that neat? How many Papa’s are crazy enough to help?

Brendan and I went to the lumber yard to check the availability of his color choices. Oddly, purple and orange aren’t popular home decor colors! Go figure. The lady behind the counter got tickled at him when he said he needed a hundred gallons of Ninja Turtle green! “A hundred gallons might be a bit much, pal.” We started with ten gallons of green, two gallons of purple and orange, and three gallons of red. The lady just chuckled when Brendan told her he was painting his room in every Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle color. “I see that, sweetie.” He just beamed with pride.

Finally, we were back at the house. Paint at the ready, rollers put together, kid in his coveralls, and the floor covered. It was time to begin. A quick lesson from Papa in the proper usage of the roller led to our first mishap.

“Okay, Brendan. All you do is roll it through the paint like this, then roll the extra stuff off so it doesn’t drip. After that, you just roll it up and down!”

Thwack! The roller made that sound when he stuck it to my leg. “Like this, Pa?” he asked as he painted my jeans green.

“Yeah, buddy. Sort of, but let’s try it on the wall!”

“Sorry, Pa. I didn’t mean to do that. I was practicing what you showed me!”

“It’s okay, baby. A man will always get covered in paint when he does this anyway.”

“This is really cool, Pa! Really cool.” Brendan exclaimed through a beaming smile.

Suddenly, standing in a small room with gooey green paint dripping down my leg didn’t seem like such a bad thing, after all.