What Comes Around Goes Around
If parenting is Karmic retribution for things you did to your own parents when you were a kid, HOLY CRAP did I talk back a lot. Er, I mean, Mr. Husband must have talked back a lot. Surely I was a perfect angel. Who talked back a lot.
Anyway, Alexis' mouth frequently writes checks her little butt can't cash. I think in some ways it's a side effect of her having a pretty solid vocabulary; her mouth knows how to say phrases that her brain doesn't fully comprehend. For example, today she told me, "I'm right and you're wrong." I'm sure her brain understands all those words, but I don't think it realizes that stringing them together is a very bad, no good idea. Although, she may have figured it out shortly after she said it.
As we sat gathered around a bowl of tortilla chips and some salsa at a local restaurant this afternoon, Alexis' mouth ran away without her brain. I don't exactly recall what she said but that's mostly because there was so much backtalk and sass and generally brattery that I lost track of the specific incidents. She has a firm grasp on the concept of Stranger Protection--the idea that she can push the limits a little further as long as there are strangers around to protect her. She also knows that the second we leave, she's toast and that she had better not push it so far that we leave early just because of her.
As we walked out the door, she wisely shut her little trap. She kept it shut all along the drive home and for a while after we had settled back in at the house. Then she said, "Momma, get me some cake."
A demand.
I glared at her.
She cowered slightly, smiled a little, and said, "Pleeeeeeease?"
I glared again. "After you were so bad at the restaurant, I'm pretty sure I won't be getting you any cake."
The look on her face said, "Crap! You remember that!" Her mouth said, "But momma, I'm apologizing!"
"It's a little late for that, my dear," I told her.
"But I apologizing!" she repeated.
I had to turn away to keep her from seeing me laugh at her odd grammar choices. "If you want cake, you're going to have to learn to be nice when we go out to eat," I said over my shoulder.
Back and forth we went, her pointing out that she was using her manners and that she was apologizing and that she was "Being nice now," and me not caring. Once she decided that she wasn't going to get anywhere with her mean mother, she ran downstairs to hang out with her dad. By then, she had forgotten all about the cake and instead set out to get to watch Hannah Montana.
Let's just say his memory isn't quite as good as mine. Either that, or he's nicer than me.
Anyway.
This is probably where I should apologize to my parents for talking back so much as a kid because OH MY HELLS BELLS do I ever (now) understand how frustrating that had to have been. It's a wonder they let me live. But, rather than apologize, I think I'll just point out that it was probably their fault anyway. My talking back was just payback for some sin they committed against their parents.
Neener neener.
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Reader Comments (15)
I'm pretty sure Em gets some of her...um...*strong*...personality from me, but some of it is her own personal creation and she seriously wears me out. I know I need to step up a little, but it's hard when she is like a little strong willed machine and she knows how to exhaust the old.
It's more fun for the grandparents I think, when the grandchild is naughty. My parents laugh whenever I complain about something one of my children have done or said. "Pay backs" and all that. And here I thought I was a total Angel, and my children got all their spunkiness from their father. Sheesh! ;)
oh good GOD I KNOW. Maggie has turned on the sass in a major way the past week or so. I don't know if it's leftover Christmas Spoilage or what but dude. It's exhausting.
the funny thing is that now, i probably tell roo about 100 times a day that one day, when *she* has a 15-year-old daughter ...
and then she tunes me out.
but payback is a bitch!
It's posts like this that make me grateful I ended up with two boys! :P
Although, my oldest has taken to prefacing his demands with 'uhhhh...' with this tone that says "hey! dumba$$!" Like "uuuhhh, my movie?" if we forget to turn it back on when it's paused.
Yeah, he's 4 going on 14.
I totally get this frustration. Genny has a mouth that does not stop. So much so that I want to shoot myself in the temple more times than not- which isn't a good thing.
ARG!
good for you for sticking to your guns!
charlotte's new thing is hiding when she did something wrong. THEN apologizing.
Neener Neener! That's what you'll be saying to Alexis when she complains to you that HER kids are talking back. I swear there must be something about January, because Dylan has had an attitude also.
Evie has turned into a bit of a stink face on the sassing score lately too. Her grammar choices (as you put it) are so completely awesome it's hard for me not to snort at her. Sometimes I do. Probably more often than I should admit. Sigh.
If I have to pay for my smart aleck mouth then I may as well just leave home now. I don't think there is any way I can survive that.
Every single time I tell the girls that they can't have something because they weren't behaving, I hear: "But I will! I will be good!" When I explain that they weren't good even when I explained the consequences, their answer is still, "But I WILL be good." Like they can't understand why I don't believe them. Le sigh.
LOVE how well you tied it down. And Alexis's "But I'm apologizing!" :)
Ah, the payback circle of life. (Look how cute she is though.)
Ooh does that sound familiar. I'm getting it right now as I tell the 3-year old he has to go to bed.
"Two more cartoons" he says...negotiating.
THey know how to do that very early, no?
I guess you really must have been awful to your parents for the payback your getting.
Funny how that's such a universal rite of passage. Every kid, everywhere, goes through that. Even The Nonverbal Oon. Oh, the sass he gives me. And drat it all, there will probably be no future retribution for him on that account.
Now, see, if it were Tommy, he would have gone downstairs not to play with his dad, but to ask for cake, thereby circumventing his mom's authority. That's a fun little game.