Every parent has a super power, or at the very
least, a secret weapon. Some parents can
successfully reprimand with a look, while some parents have the parental consistency
of leading child psychologists.
I have neither.
My cognitive influence peters out somewhere
between “Don’t make me stop this car!” and “Because I said so!” What I lack in super powers I make up for in
secret weapons. In my house, softness of
voice is a liability. If nothing else,
my parental edge has been sharpened by the boom in my voice—it can be heard
through house walls and over running lawn mowers.
But sometimes, a booming voice isn’t enough.
Now that Max has discovered the great outdoors,
it’s nearly impossible to get him back indoors.
“Are you ready to go in?” I’ll ask for the 50th time.
“No-ah!” He’ll
grin back.
It’s then I dig into my supernatural bag of
tricks.
“Max, you better come in,” I’ll say
worried-like. “I think the monsters are
coming.”
His already wide eyes grow wider as he hurriedly
gathers all his toy trains from his pile of dirt. You can see he adrenaline pumping as he
begins to whimper and then cry in despair.
I’m not completely heartless—I do hold the door
open for him as he scampers inside.
Sometimes effective parenting just can’t be
achieved with complete honesty.
Take the tooth fairy. She runs fairly well the first or second
time. By the eighth or ninth tooth,
forget it.
“Oh, Sam!”
I’ve been known to say; “I think she left your dollar in my wallet last
night.”
And the Lorain County Fair (or Chuck E. Cheese or
Burger King play land) have all been known to “burn down” after multiple nags from
the kiddies to go there.
Mostly, my lies are just a type of inexpensive
humor that I draw upon when reality parenting is overwhelming at best.
Is it ethical?
Probably not, but as an underpaid parent, I kind
of feel a sense of entitlement.
After all, with this job, I figure my kids get
what they pay for.
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