My stepson, as you know if you follow this blog regularly, is a Life member of a national youth paramilitary organization. You know it as the Boy Scouts of America. (I like pulling people's chains with technically true but shocking-sounding descriptions like that. I personally belong to a world-wide countercultural religious cult. You may know it better as the Roman Catholic Church.)
Today, to his chagrin, we worked together on the early requirements for the Family Life merit badge. One of the early requirements is to "discuss how the actions of an individual can effect other members [of a family.]"
He was irritated I was making him do this rather than let him watch FX on cable and rot his brain all day, so he pretended not to know how to answer this requirement.
"Look at it this way," I said. "Suppose one member of the family is completely selfish..."
"You're going to make this about ME, aren't you?" he said.
"No," I said. "Assume it's me. Assume every Monday, I came home and ate dinner and then said 'I'm going bowling now, see ya.' Assume every Tuesday, I came home and ate dinner and said 'I'm going to go drink some beers with friends, see ya.'"
"Assume every day he blew us off to go hunting or fishing," said his mother, thinking of a brother-in-law we all know and love.
Inspiration hit. "Suppose," I said, with his mother in clear earshot, "I came home one night, ate dinner, and said 'I met this cute girl at work and we're going to a movie, see ya.' How would you feel?"
His response was immediate. "I'd kick your ass," he said.
"You'd kick my ass," I repeated. "And why?"
"Because you're supposed to be faithful to my mother," he said.
"Good answer," I said.
God help us, we've done one thing right raising that kid...
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