TheWRITEaddiction.com

I wanted to write about the time my oldest daughter tricked me and my husband into signing a contract.  I wanted to write about the hilarious things that my son says every day.  Or the time my 19 month-old caught me slipping and repeated an expletive she just heard me say.  I wanted give you a story that would make you laugh at the on-going shenanigans that make up my life.  But the assignment calls for something different.

The assignment was to write the craziest thing a child has ever said to me.  I am no stranger to crazy talk from children.  Not only am I parent, but I also teach Sunday school.  The things our children say at church…Well, let’s just say, you never know what to expect.

Sadly, the most outrageous thing I have ever heard from a child was not nearly as funny.  I didn’t chuckle to myself as I walked away.  It’s not a funny story I can share with my children years down the road.  It wasn’t a joke.  It wasn’t even a sentence, just a word.  The word.

N….I can’t even type the rest.

I was new to the neighborhood.  My husband and I had just bought our house.   We were pretty excited about life.  Our neighbors were phenomenal.  We were both working.  Our bills were manageable.  We had settled into our roles at church.  Life was good.

I walk out the door of my home and there they were.  Three innocent little boys on bicycles.  I smiled and thought, “Oh the joys of youth.  No bills, no worries.  Just me and the wind whipping threw my hair as I pedaled my way to freedom (or as you know it, the end of the block).  I looked up and I heard it.  And then a second time.

Now wait a minute.  These kids don’t know me.  I’m not always as even tempered as I appear to be.  For a second I thought I might accidentally forget to look in my rearview mirror as I backed out of my driveway.  I shot one of them a look that dared him to a say it again.  He pedaled as fast as he could to the next block over.  The other two followed his lead.

I wanted to explain to them that just like their parents, I went to work every day.  I wanted them to know that my glorious Afro was just as beautiful as the stick straight tresses they favored.

But I also needed them to know that that word, which they mistakenly thought would belittle me just made me realize how small they were.  I wondered how such hate could fill their adolescent bodies.  I wondered what small-minded adult poured such vitriole into their undeveloped brains.  I wondered if their simple world view included a view of anything outside of a 10 block radius.

Kids say the darnedest things.

Except sometimes, it’s a damning critique of their environment.

God bless the children.

Mama Radford