This morning, Christine called me at work to relay this story:

Christine went out to the car with the kids to take Jack to school, put the top down, strapped both kids in, and then couldn’t find the key to the car. Which she needed to put the top down, so she’d obviously had it with her…

She called me on my cell (I was almost at the office by the time she called) to see if I’d left my key to the car at home. I hadn’t. It was in my pocket. She hung up with me, and I could tell she was frustrated.

She got the kids out of the car, to look in their car seats. Backtracked her footsteps out of the house. Looked around the kitchen. Dug through the car. She was really frustrated, and was about to say “forget it, we’re not going to school.” Then she realized she’d thrown something away that morning in the big outside trashcan, and it being trash day, that meant she might have also had the key in her hand and absentmindedly thrown the key away too, so she walked down to check, and the key was on the ground next to the recycling bins. It had fallen out of her pants pocket.

She loaded the kids back up in the car, and took Jack to school.

On the way to school on Mopac, Christine realized then how frustrated she’d been, so she apologized to Jack and Grayson for throwing a fit, and tried to explain that she was sorry she’d been impatient, and that it was nothing they’d done, it was just her losing her temper, and that she was wrong and was sorry.

Jack sat there quietly for a few moments and finally asked “Mommy, why did you say ‘SHIT!’ this morning?”

Christine didn’t know what to say for a moment. She finally answered “Jack, Mommy used a bad word that she shouldn’t have use. Mommy is not supposed to say the word ‘shit’.”

She then asked Jack if he understood that he isn’t supposed to use that word either.

Jack responded, “Yes, mommy. Shit is a bad word and Mommy is not supposed to say ‘shit!’ and Jack is not supposed to say ‘shit!'”.

Christine just said “That’s right” and dropped it.

A few minutes later she dropped him off at pre-school at the church.”

This afternoon will be interesting when she picks him up from school. Hopefully he doesn’t say ‘shit’ at school today… but if he does… oh well…

Here’s to getting our first kid to three and three-quarters years old without cussing.

Welcome to the real world Jack! 😉

I wonder how long we can get Grayson without cussing?