Oh my, this parenting business is truly a roller coaster not for the faint of heart. The writing of this story was delayed about a week so that I had time to get over my public mortification and embarrassment. I’ve successfully maneuvered through my walk of shame and am now ready to share another chapter in my life with boys. Disclaimer: All parties, except for my boys, will remain anonymous to protect the innocent.
Each day when the boys get out of school the absolute first question that I ask my oldest is, “Owen did you stay in the GREEN today”? The color indicates that he’s been a “good” boy for the day and didn’t have any mishaps with friends or with the teachers and that his behavior was at least better than all of the other hooligans in his class. Most days he tells me joyfully, I stayed in the GREEN, we exchange high-fives and go about our business… or he shares intel about the other kids who got on YELLOW or even the most reviled color RED…and explains in super specific detail what they did, how it all went down, who were the accomplices, kids he stays away from for fear of the other colored cards.
This brings me to last week…
Me: Owen did you stay in the GREEN?
Owen: Yeaaah…um, no, I didn’t (slight pause, head shifting down) I got a YELLOW card.
Me: What happened buddy, why didn’t you stay in the GREEN?
Owen: I was talking to (friend) and I told him that when my mom gets mad she says SH*T
Me: WHAT?! Owen, you said that in class?!
Owen: Then (friend) told (Instructional Aid) who then told (teacher who also acts as the principal of the school) and Mrs. Tonotbenamed pulled my YELLOW card.
Me: (BIG PAUSE …and in my mind I’m thinking oh SH*T!)
Owen we don’t say that word, that’s a bad word.
Owen: I know…that’s what Mrs. Tonotbenamed said…she told me to never ever say that word again. Are you mad?
Me: (still thinking in my head SH*T)…yes I am furious that you would say that word.
I like to give Chris a quick text if I feel like it’s going to be a crap-a-licious evening, you know, just to give him some warning so that he’s not walking through the front door all joyful and BAM, I smack him on the head with an ugly stick. But since I was driving home and I was angry, I didn’t want to put us in more danger by texting, so I called him and said two words… BAD NIGHT! Silence on the other end of the phone and a quick “ok, we’ll talk when I get home”.
By the time Chris got home, Owen and I had re-hashed the entire events of the day, hour by hour, to figure out what Owen had said, why he said it, who he had said it to, who heard, and in doing so probably said SH*T a thousand more times. All I remember is telling Luke that he should never say the word that his mama was now using in every sentence. To make matters worse, Owen’s enunciation of the word was remarkably clear…every last letter could be heard and he used it appropriately in a sentence…if only he would/could do that with all of the sight words he has been learning. Things got even worse because Owen then started to flip flop on which bad word he had said…first it was SH*T and then it turned into A$$, although he couldn’t quite say it correctly (thank goodness) and instead was saying AST. Phew, that was a close one!
Chris gets home and I’m a mess. We sneak away to our official family meeting room, which is our closet. Since there is no lock on the closet door I stand against it in case the little monsters try to enter, which I can hear them just outside the door trying to turn the nob. I tell Chris the whole story and he’s all relieved since he thought that it was something truly horrific…and for whatever reason, I wasn’t relieved, because this was horrific in my mind. I’m a horrible mother…the worst ever…no mother says SH*T when she’s mad at her kid.
I wake up the next morning still very upset that I have such a potty mouth. Owen and I talk everything over and I apologize for not using good words, we hug and are all better until I realize (
We get to the school and start to go through our normal routine… getting kids, backpacks, lunch boxes, and jackets out of the car. After we zip up our jackets we then begin the s.l.o.w. walk of shame through the parking lot and into Owen’s classroom. We first run into the Instructional Aide, she smiles at me and I know that she knows, and dang it, his card is still yellow and that’s all it takes…my face turns beet red and I quickly give Owen a hug and take Luke to his class. Of course I totally jinx myself because I think that at least I didn’t have to face Mrs. Tonotbenamed (you know, the principal of the school!)…and as I begin the walk out to my car after dropping off Luke, there she is. She and I exchange good mornings and off I slink to my car. Oh, the horror.
Of course it all seems super funny to me now…not so much last week.
Lesson #1,458 – never ever say bad words!
