Monday, February 9, 2009

Children stupid actions

So, life has been dull lately, for which I am amazingly grateful. The highlight of the last two weeks was the fact that I have REALLY disciplined my children for the first time. I am not talking about the psychotic mommy screaming at them which you know will be the bread-and-butter of future "My mom is insane" stories and which still reduces them to tears but has zero long term impact, but where there is a slim chance they will remember it. At least one of my children will, at least. My middle child who is the one making the majority of the stupid personal decisions (I can quickly think of at least 3 times with squealing brakes and shattered looking faces on drivers when he ignored the fact it was a street) is also the one who seems to retain the message the longest. I am not an overprotective mother, but I do like to have the vaguest idea of where my kids are, even if it is simply "outside." The other day Monkey Boy went outside and my only instruction was tell me where he was going. If you go inside somewhere, tell me. Of course, he did not do this. I knew he was one of two places, but there is that embarrassing phone call to the wrong parent (oh, 2 hours after I should have made it?), "Do you have my kid?" and they don't. I finally called the correct parent and told her, "Tell him to run. He is in trouble." My son is FAST and he ran in screaming "I KNOW! I FORGOT TO CALL!" So, he lost all screen time (video, tv, computer) for 4 days which culminated in him literally lying on the couch moaning, "Can I do ANY chore to make this end sooner?"

Meanwhile, Bunny got herself grounded for two weeks. She is almost a pre-teen, which means that she is starting to think about lying. A lot. Nothing makes me crazier than a liar. Except a liar who blames the mistake on her five-year-old brother. So, she has been grounded for two weeks. She is oblivious. She is secretly defiant. She sits and "reads" while Boo watches TV. She tells Monkey Boy how to navigate a page (which is sort of like telling A-Rod how to play baseball). Next time she is grounded, I am going to add "NO Books." If she can read, she isn't being punished.

Yesterday I told her I was going to show her something on the computer. She happily bounced upstairs, just so I could go through a power point presentation on the perils of methamphetamine, lingering long over the rotten teeth and abscesses in the arms from shooting up. She was begging me to quit, but, oh, no, I had a platform. My poor kids - I have been on a two year tirade about drugs and sex, and I feel fairly confident that they are going to see through many smoke screens that might get thrown up in their faces. Of course, this has been a long time coming.

I have always been offended by calling parts "weenies" and "down there" and so I have always used the technical language. This has come back to bite me, one instance in particular. My children were sitting in Target (they were 3 and 4) in a shopping cart. We were waiting to check out on a particularly busy day, so they decided it was time to talk anatomy in the LOUDEST POSSIBLE VOICES. DS: Do you have a PENIS? DD: No, I have a VAGINA. Girls have VAGINAS, boys have PENISES!!!!!" The woman in front of me was standing straighter and straighter while the mother behind me was openly laughing. DS went through a period where he was always checking to make sure his "package" (there I go with an euphemism, but it is a blog for all) was still there. I don't know why boys do this, but he spent a good 6 months holding his friend. I tried to ignore it or do the "this is for private time" thing, but I should have just told the washing machine for all it mattered. Anyway, Christmas Eve rolled around. It was the family service. He trotted down to the front alter to listen to the story and stood by the storyteller so he could see. He immediately checked to make sure he had brought his stuff with him. My church looks very much like a European cathedral, and it has the accompanying acoustics. Anyway, I watched this for about 5 minutes in total mortification until I couldn't stand it and he didn't respond to the flailing hands of his mother at all. So finally I went and snatched him up and whispered in his ear, "Get you hand out of your pants!" And which point he screamed and the whole church got to hear, "I LIKE TO TOUCH MY PENIS!!!!!" Yes, I will tell this to his prom date, first girlfriend, future wife.

Husband dear is trying to woo me to Europe this year. For most people, they don't view this as a trial, but he comes from a very beautiful, extremely boring (and rainy) part of Deutschland. This year he has promised an "extra" vacation where we actually go somewhere fun and warm and with ANYTHING to do. Whenever we go to Eutin, one of my highlights is going into the back yard with salt and killing slugs. Yes, I actually look forward to this because I am slug-phobic and killing them soothes a deep part of my soul. And I am happy to concede that my mother-in-law is a far better cook than me.

So, this year he is dangling Crete in front of me. I am quite happy about this, but I don't expect it to happen. However, he is giving me time to plan my trip. Every time a place is suggested, I go and strip the library shelves and spend six months in preparation, watching, reading, organizing, etc. I make plan books that list the opening times/dates of museums, the highlights you must see, the restaurants we need to eat. I would have been fantastic as a planner of D-Day. By the time we get to the vacation spot, there is no opportunity for saying "Oh, I didn't know that!" I can be led astray by pretty flowers and shiny things or fried foods, but for the most part, I love planning our lives completely on a trip. I am so type A about this, I HONEST TO GOD had us be the first car in the Disneyland parking lot. And I started screaming at them to "GET OUT OF THE CAR NOW!!!" because cars were coming in after us and we would not be first in line at the breakfast buffet with Chip and Dale. We were done with Disneyland in two hours because of the extreme amount of planning. The next day I did not plan and we were unable to get on the Dumbo ride because we went there oh, whenever...So, right now I am immersed in Minotaurs, caves, beaches, Minoan archeology, etc. Even if we don't go, it has distracted me from my disobedient children.

3 comments:

K Storm said...

Oh, Stephanie! You got me laughing this afternoon.

Adrienne Martini said...

The story of the child and his penis in church still amuses the crap out of me. My other fave is the one about milking.....

doris said...

You are now officially the funniest person I know ... thank you!