My five- year- old son is a really good kid. He just doesn't realize it sometimes.

He has the ability to speak clearly, carry on lively conversations, and socialize like a sorority girl during rush week. He can entertain himself for hours and give his parents the time to do the things that pop up during a normal adult life.

That's a good kid. That's my son…usually.

Apparently, this past weekend my son just completely forgot all those qualities that make him good. I probably could have predicted his memory lapse, because this past weekend's set- up was new to him, and all his usual securities were not available.

For starters, this was not a party at a bouncy house or McDonald's play land. It didn't involve presents and birthday cake or 25 other five- year- olds hopped up on sugar. This little event was actually about me. It was a lake party with several of my old high school buddies and some of their children.

The next issue and probably the biggest problem was that my wife and our two daughters were out of town and did not go to the party with us.

So my son was basically on his own with a bunch of adults, a preoccupied father, and no one to turn to other than several small children he didn't know. It was strange territory for him, and I was sympathetic to a point, but I thought I'd been to enough Chuck E Cheese's to earn this one day. My son had other ideas.

As my buddies and I floated around in the lake talking and trying to catch- up, my son decided it would be a great time to climb over my head and dunk me over and over. While he was taking great joy in this, I was struggling to breath and struggling even harder to hear what my friends were saying.

When he got bored with this, he decided he wanted to take a trip in a kayak. Upon our return, he was hungry. Boredom often makes him hungry. So we trudged up the dock across the yard and up to my friend's lake house to retrieve a pack of crackers. Back in the water 30 minutes later, he was hungry again.

This time, I got us out of the lake and into dry clothes so we could hang out at the house with the rest of the guests and he could eat his crackers. Instead, my son thought this would be a good time to wander off. I found him at a playground set next door where he promptly asked me to push him on the swing.

I see my old friends about as often as I see Santa Claus. So when I get the chance to hang out with them, I cherish it. By the time I finished being dunked, the Kayak trip, a couple of cracker runs, and a brief search followed by swing time, I'm pretty sure I could have had less trouble and found out more about my buddies through email than with this trip to the lake.

After we ate dinner, I found my son playing Kung Fu Panda with two of the other children. Finally, he looked like he was having fun and I could get some grown- up time.

Unfortunately by then, it was time to go.