Throwing Mom Under the Bus

                   
I came home from work Thursday and sat down with the kids and we chatted until it has time to do homework. My 9 year old had to write a narrative and I had to proof read it. She has this book for school and the teacher gives them a subject to write on and they write an experience that happened to them. Well the subject given for this assignment was to tell about a time there were scared. I opened the composition book and see the title, "Halloween in the Swamp." NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! The haunted trail strikes again.

So I proofed this story and it talked about how her mom took her to the haunted swamp and how she felt like a "victim" - yeah, she said victim. How her sister screamed, "I think we're going to die." Overall, how traumatizing it was. I was reading it thinking that her teacher is going to think I am the absolute worst mom ever. So then I started reading other entries in this journal. It started off about her life and she wrote about how much she loves her mom and dad and there are stories about the summer and stories about the fun things we do, about her friends. Peppered in are some stories that feature our questionable parenting. Like how we didn't realize her hampster was dead for two days and how he died inside his tube and was bloated and couldn't be removed and so had to be disposed of inside the tube. Horrible. Then she did another story about being scared  - the time when she watched the Conjuring trailer with my husband. Just the trailer. Then she wrote, "I have watched a lot of horror movies." Holy hell - her teacher is going to think we are inappropriate axe wielding maniacs. She's going to think I let my kids watch Texas Chainsaw massacre and Saw and Jason. Or worse, IT. I confronted her on that one. "What do you mean you've watched a lot of horror movies,- you have not." She was insistent. "Yes I have." So I had her name them. "Carrie, Sleepy Hollow, Signs, Adams Family, Little Shop of Horrors, Killer Klowns from Outer Space....." I didn't tell her that her list of "horror" movies was slightly lame.

No conversation is complete without the commentary of my 7 year old - she rolled her eyes, "Killer Klowns from Outer Space is not scary. I love that movie." She really does, she's a weirdo. "Mama, I like that movie but I hate clowns. They are creepy. I really hate the McDonald's clown. He's creepy and he might kidnap children." Ronald McDonald - kidnapping kids since 1954.