Friday, February 18, 2011

2/18/2011 Note to the teacher, and boys

Julian's "poor" behavior report for the week resulted in his being compelled to write a note to the teacher:




Dear Teacher,
I am sorry for doing Kung fu moves. I will never do it again.
From, Julian.


Julian's behavior in class is declining; he's messing around a lot, and apparently this week kept getting out of his chair to show off kung fu moves in class. (And I'm about to spend another $300 to continue his lessons?!)

Dave was stunned tonight when Katrina cleaned up some cards that had been scattered all over the floor -- without even being asked. Meantime, the boys present an ongoing struggle every morning to walk them through each normal step of the day -- never mind something that isn't part of a daily routine. We're not used to that level of advanced thought!

I worked late tonight, and Dave ran out to get takeout. We're probably horrible illegal immoral prosecutable offensive parents for doing this, but we do leave Gabriel alone sometimes. What's more, twice now we've even left Gabriel and Katrina alone for a few minutes, like tonight to zoom out to get takeout when another parent is on their way home and running late). Gabriel knows how to call Dave, and we tell him to mind Katrina, and he takes that job seriously.

While you Gentle Reader might think very little of us for doing leaving our children at home alone for more than 30 seconds, consider this: we wouldn't dream of leaving the boys alone together for more than 5 seconds. Gabriel and Katrina are a far more trustworthy pair than Julian and....well, anyone.

I'm not sure what that says about us as parents or people, but in my defensive opinion, it says more about how boys are compared to girls than it does about us. I hear girls dish out their share when they're older, but for now I'm here to tell you: boys are way, way more difficult, less trustworthy, more inclined toward violence and chaos, more defiant, more impossible in nearly every way, than girls at this age.

Any girl-mom who's feeling skeptical right now, I ask: have you ever arrived at a nice restaurant's valet parking and discovered one of your girls' faces covered in blood, matted in her hair, spread all over her face so you couldn't find where it was coming from, dripping all over her jacket and clothes -- because she got punched in the nose by her sister?

Katrina drives me crazy in her own way, and you all know I'm more in my element in the boy-world than the girl-world. Girls have their issues too, I know. But you can probably leave them alone together at younger ages without worrying about broken bones or the house being set on fire. And they don't write as many notes of apology to the teacher!

Blood, notes and all, I do dearly love my boys though.

2/18/2011

1 comment:

MommaWriter said...

I leave Smunch fairly regularly. He knows how to call too...although he does a crappy job of answering the phone. I don't like leaving them alone together though (I think I did it once when I really had to go to the store). They might not get in trouble, but Mam is very likely to be annoying and Smunch is more than likely to be violently annoyed.