Thursday, September 27, 2012

Your house is only another mile

So yesterday? I get a text from the Boy Child telling me something is wrong with the school bus.

Bless his heart, he's not a very mechanical person (neither am I!) so he explained this as "something with the engine or something is struggling" to which I responded "Good Lord".

He asked if I could come pick them up, and also could I pick up their friend from the neighborhood? I said yes and asked, "Where are you?"

And he replied:

On the bus




Really?

Yes sweetheart. I'm aware you are on the bus. I just don't know where the bus IS.



When I finally figured out, with no help from the Boy Child, that the bus had not left the school, I then drove the three miles or so to pick up the children and their sweet friend. They got off the bus, the bus driver yelled, I made some comment in the "Bus Driver from South Park" voice that I do so well (YOU KIDS SIT DOWN!!) and we were on our merry way.

As I was making a left turn out of the parking lot I heard the Girl Child explain to her friend, "So, this is our car."

It made me kind of giggle. The sweetness of it. I love how everything is "ours", love how they take ownership of things.  I remembered when they were very small and we lived in our townhouse. Someone came to visit and they were so proud of our home that they went to every room (all five or so of them) and showed the visitor everything. The Boy flung open the door to the half-bath and said, proudly, "And we have a toilet!" Amazing.

Boy Child does not have such fond memories and he scoffed and said, "No, Girl Child. This isn't really our car. We just stole it."

"I like to jack cars for a living," I said casually, kinda/sorta forgetting there was a visitor in the car.

She paused for a few seconds. I glanced at her in the rear-view mirror.

Well crap Stephanie. You've stuck your foot in your mouth again. This is just like a couple of weeks ago when we met our new neighbors and their little girl just loved Jason and kept hanging on his legs and wanting him to pick her up and you said, like a big dumbass, "Oh all little girls just love Jason!" And even though all you meant was "Jason has a ton of nieces and they just adore him" the neighbor got this LOOK on her face and then you thought, "Oh Lawd, could I seriously have said anything more stupid to make my husband look like a big perv or some crap?" Jesus God. And I mean I can't exactly say, "I swear he's not a big pervert and I didn't mean it like that!"  because they already hate you because they are Florida State fans and they made a comment about how Ginger wears a University of Tennessee collar and good God. I should just never speak to anyone ever.


From the backseat, the neighbor girl said, quietly and quite seriously, "So. How many cars per week do you steal?"


I glanced at the Boy Child and said, "Good. She can hang with us."





It's probably sad that the people who I best relate to are 14.


But it's okay. I know some really awesome people that age.

3 comments:

Christina Berry said...

I love the relationship you have with your kids - and apparently with the neighbor kids as well!

Great story! :)

Karen said...

I laughed so hard I snorted when I read about how you "outed" Jason as a perv to your neighbors. Gawd don't you hate it when you say something like that, and then you know that if you continue to babble about what you really meant it just looks worse, so you just shut up and hope that no one calls the vice squad. LOL It's like that saying, "It's best to be thought a fool, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt." Ha! :)

Steph said...

RIGHT?!!? I do that ALL. THE. TIME.