Last night my co-teacher for our primary class emailed me and asked if I could prepare the lesson for today since her little boy was throwing up and she wasn't sure what the morning would bring.
I grumbled a bit and had nightmares about it (which doesn't really make sense since I teach every other week anyway so it wasn't some huge undertaking) and then this morning I prepared my lesson. The more I prepared the more I reminisced. It's funny that of all the lessons I've taught this year, "I will tell the truth" brought back the most memories.
I don't know if I just lied a lot when I was little but I a few very defining moments centered around lies I told. None of these lies were awful lies but I think they sort of defined me at a young age.
When I was little I was lying in my parents bed, where I should have been taking a nap but instead I was playing with a lamp - turning it off and on and on and off. A lamp I was told several times not to touch. At some point my playing with the lamp, resulted in it tipping over and the light bulb fell on my cheek. It hurt so bad but I couldn't do anything because then I would be in trouble for touching it. So I think I finally just fell asleep. I don't recall how much time passed but when my mom came to get me up from my nap I had a huge welt on my face. My mom asked me what happened and I decided it would be best to play naive and innocent. After a trip to urgent care, it was decided that a spider had bitten me and we were sent to the pharmacy with an expensive prescription.
As my dad was in the pharmacy paying for this antibiotic I started to feel really guilty and I confessed to my mom what had actually happened. Unfortunately, we'd already had to pay for the doctor visit and it was that exact moment that my dad exited the store with my prescription. I will always remember that. I think I was four or five at the time but I remember my mom explaining to me how we didn't have a lot of money and my little lie had cost them money that we'd usually use to pay bills and groceries.
My other defining moment/lie was when I was four (if memory serves me correctly). Me and my sister kept turning the power on the computer on and off. My mom was already frustrated with one thing or another and she asked us to quit playing with the computer. But ... being a kid I decided to push my luck and turned it back on again. Just at that moment my mom walked in and noticed the computer was back on. She got upset and I started to get in trouble so I immediately surrendered my sister. Insisting that it had been her who'd done it. My mom sent my sister to her room with an unusual spanking. (I only remember my mom ever spanking me once so watching my sister get spanked over something I did was traumatic, to say the least). I don't recall much of what happened next but I know eventually I told the truth and my mom felt awful about the whole thing as well.
It's funny the memories that stick with us. I guess I've shared my two worst lies. Or at least the two lies that stuck with me because of what happened as a result. So teaching this lesson was actually pretty fun. And getting to hear of times when kids in our class chose to tell the truth was even more fun. They are a bright bunch of kids.
So the moral of today's blog --- Tell the truth.
3 comments:
Those are such cute stories. ... if it can be cute to lie, that is. Especially funny to me because Will has reached that age. He occasionally pawns blame off on Teresa when I know full well he is the perpetrator.
In 1st grade, Caroline stood up in show and tell and told everyone that I had gotten a needle in my eye. I guess that she was very believable, because everyone, including the teacher, believed her. When the teacher asked me later how my eye was healing, and discovered by my confusion that she had been tricked, she suggested Caroline see the school psychologist. I think that she was kind of mad that she had fallen for it. My friend and another teacher assured me that telling an occasional lie at that age is totally normal! Caroline very sheepishly told me that she had not prepared for show and tell that day!
Oh the things kids do, if those are your worst lies ever I think you must have been a great kid! I remember doing so much more.
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