Let me explain. 15 years ago or so, my brother and I coined the term 'yorq' as a synonym for vomit (a.k.a. 'barf', 'boot', 'technicolor yawn'). I can't explain why in a public forum, but suffice it to say it involved a meal on York Avenue.
My eldest son is the Duke of Yorq just because he nearly had a spectacular case of yorqing that would have gone down in Styx family history. Thankfully, he missed. Had he not, it would have been legendary.
Setting the Stage
My sons share a bedroom and a special bunk-bed (pictured to the right), made only by Berg designers. Since my oldest is 4 and a half, he's too young for a full bunk bed (6 is the recommended minimum). And his brother (2 years old) would also be in danger. But the Berg bed allows the space-saving of a bunk (with many drawers, as you can see) with some safety.
My oldest has the top bunk, the youngest the bottom. The youngest was asleep. The oldest was coughing a bunch. Both had colds; but the oldest had yorqed earlier in the week (Shabbas) from the cold; the doctor explained (warning: do not read further if you're the squeamish type and/or never had kids) that he probably was swallowing some mucus. So if he's coughing too much, it can lead to yorq.
The Event
Around 7:30pm, my wife and I were downstairs in the kitchen, cleaning up and going over how crazy it still was in our new Boston life... we just felt over our heads because the house still needs a bunch of work, our car needs new brakes, the new semester has begun with stress on our schedules... then we heard our oldest call out over the monitor that his cough was bothering him. I went upstairs to see how he was, but also to quiet him down lest he wake his brother.
I came into the room and because I saw that, yup, his brother was asleep, I whispered "do you want a drink of water?" He said that he does. I went to get it, and he then asked (from the top bunk) whether he could come with me to get the water. I said that he could and walked back to him to help him walk down the steps of the bunk bed. And that point he coughed, gagged, and yorqed onto the lower bed.
What It Was and What it Could Have Been
There was no logical reason why he should have yorqed directly onto the lower bunk. Of the 360 degrees available to his torso and face, only 15 degrees was directly in line with his sleeping brother below. Yet that's where he booted.
Thank God, his brother was perched slightly away from the bed because the older narrowly missed hitting the younger. If it had connected, it would have been a family legend, remembered 90 years in the future by the two now old men, great-grandchildren at their knees, telling the story about how the older barfed on the younger while still toddlers. My younger would be telling his shrink in 20 years "I never feel secure;" when asked why he'd tell this story, because, honestly, who can feel secure when someone barfs on you in your sleep?
Anyway, I quickly picked up the younger from his bed so he wouldn't get hit by a probable second salvo. It took almost an hour to clean up the entire bed (nothing really escaped: books, toys, pillows) and the boys are fine now.
But I am the King of England...
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