How ‘bout that for an attention-grabbing tagline? If it sounds like it came straight from the mind of an imaginative child, then you’re spot on.
My dear little girl Claire was troubled by something for a few days last week, and after a few days of the anxiety weaving through and wrapping around my sweet 8-year-old, the whole story finally came tumbling out. Turns out that while we were on our vacation several weeks ago, her class was given instructions for their first of the four book reports and presentations that they will do this year. When she returned to class, she was given the written directions, but somehow lost them (if you were looking for another example of the apple not falling far from the tree, there’s a perfect case in point if ever there were one). The book report was due in three days, and she was terrified to talk to the teacher about getting the instruction sheet she needed to complete the assignment.
Now, if her teacher were crabby, like a few teachers I’ve known, or unpredictable, like a few bosses I’ve had, or just even simply unpleasant, like a few guys I’ve dated, then I could understand her fear. And wobbling, shaking fear it is — we’re not talking garden-variety trepidation here. She is genuinely sobbing and shaking while talking to me about this. In fact, at points she is crying so hard that I can tell she cannot even see me, and she’s trying to keep her eyes open and focused but can’t, so she’s rubbing her face furiously to wipe the tears, only to get her hair wet and tangled and clinging to her face at odd angles. Like she needed any further complicating trauma at this point.
FINALLY Claire tells me that Mrs. V has told the class several times that if they don’t listen, don’t do their homework, forget a book, etc., that she’ll hang them from the ceiling by their toenails. As I try to control the laughter quaking from the deepest part of my core—despite the hilarity I am in control enough to realize that the last thing she needs is me laughing at her just then—I tell her, “Oh, honey! She was just teasing you! She doesn’t really do that.” To which Claire wailed despairingly, “Oh yes she does, Mama!! If you look at the ceiling you can see the marks of the toenails from the kids she punished last year!” and she completely dissolves in to a quivering mass of 8-year-old raw nerves.
How evil a mother am I, that all I could think of at that moment was telling this to her fiancé in 20 years? Or telling her grandparents tomorrow? Or even just getting her up to her bed so I could roll on the floor laughing…?
Needless to say, I did get her calm enough to admit that this is a problem that she is capable of solving, and that she CAN and WILL talk to Mrs. V in the morning. She will admit she lost the worksheet, ask for a new one, and make sure she understands everything on it. Then she will bring it home and I will help her make sure she completes it on time.
As I hugged her good-night, I SO wanted to suggest that if, in fact, this really might be the last night with her toenails intact, that maybe we should put a quick coat of polish on them to make her feel pretty. But, I bit the inside of my cheek hard enough that I tasted blood, and that icky taste distracted me just enough to get out of her room without saying something really insensitive.
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I have been laughing the entire time I read this. Your little one sure is a worry wart … oh so funny!