My Ears Are Burning

Are you one of those people that is really bothered by the idea of people talking about you  when you're not around?  I am.  I am an eternal I-care-what-people-think person, and sometimes I let other people's opinions weigh more than my own. 

For people like me, however, it always helps to fall back on the knowledge that my family loves and cares for me, no matter how messy my hair is, or how much TV my kids watch or how many thousands of playground chipped-tire chunks are on my floor. 

But I'd never really considered what my kids say about me when I'm not around.  I figured that they appropriated a sufficient amount of adoration for me as their mother, but I also knew that my role as disciplinarian and vegetable monger probably leads to a few cold words now and then.  It occured to me, though, that in nearly six years of parenting (four for Graham) I'd never heard what my boys really think of me.

One night last week, I got my chance. 

While I was preparing a load of laundry, I realized that I hadn't gathered the dirty clothes from the boys' room.  Thinking that they would be asleep, I quietly crept downstairs and turned the knob on the door before I heard voices.  And if I was expecting to hear a glowing review of myself, I was in for a surprise.  A very confusing, bizarre surprise.

"Graham, do you think Mommy and Daddy are superheroes?

"Yeah.  I think that Daddy can break buildings and Mommy can start fires."

"Cool, Graham.  And I bet Mommy starts fires all day when we're at school.  I bet she starts them and puts them out right away so nothing gets burned.  But maybe sometimes things get burned.  Maybe that's where the Wii remotes went."

"Yes, Cael.  And when we're asleep at night, she's not upstairs with Daddy.  She's in New York City lighting bad guys on fire and making cold things hot with fire."

"Maybe when it's hot in the summer, she makes ice, too, Graham.  Like Frozone!  And if we get in really big trouble, like if we fight and break something, she'll put us in a block of ice."

"No, Cael!  Mommy wouldn't do that!"

"Do you think she'd use her fire on us?"

"No!  Mommy is nice.  She won't use fire or ice on us.  But maybe she would use the squirrels..."

"No, Graham, not the squirrels!..."

Photo credit here.

Maybe I can use this to my advantage.  After I assure Cael that I won't be attacking him with ice or fire, of course.  But I make no promises about the squirrels...