"So you lock your kids' up during the day?" "Yep."

Now read that again without the apostrophe. Sounds exactly the same, right? So to someone who might have been standing nearby, inadvertently listening to our conversation, this interchange might come across as a bit, mmm, odd. But in the written form it suggests that there might be something else to it, all because of that cute little punctuation mark. I don't mean to sound nerdy here, but I think we need to take a moment to appreciate the power of punctuation. We've all heard of the somewhat-dramatic-yet-powerfully-accurate slogan, "Punctuation Saves Lives," haven't we? You know the one: "Let's eat grandma. Let's eat, grandma." I mean really, without those little marks we'd be constantly backtracking and explaining just what the heck we meant. But instead, thanks to them, we can freely write down our thoughts without a worry in the world that we might be misunderstood. (clearly I don't mean that at all since I'm constantly explaining myself in this blog). But anyway, you get the point. The gesture. The intention. So there we were, my friend and I, waiting for our kinders to come out after their first day of school today, just chatting about stuff, when we casually had this exchange. We were innocently talking about biking to school...buying another lock since three bikes on one lock was a bit of a stretch...etc. She actually pointed out the humor in it, since I, apparently, have become almost oblivious to the strangeness of parental interactions these days. So perhaps I owe her a thanks as well. Thank you, friend, for appreciating the power of punctuation and pointing out the preposterousness of our parlance.

"It's not a good day for eyeballs, huh?"

You could just hear the kindness in her tone, the empathy with which she uttered these words to her teary-eyed daughter, the patience in how she shared examples of recent poke-age. I'm sure my friend never planned on ever feeling the need to give a shout out to eyeballs, giving them a moment of silence, or even working them sympathetically into a conversation. But, alas, here she was, most seriously referring to them as if they had feelings and needed some well-deserved recognition. Her little girl just nodded at her words and intermittently added to the memories of when my own son got gored with a sword and when her sister poked herself in the eye while trying to move some hair out of her face. It seemed as though once she realized she was not alone in having to temporarily walk around with one eye shut, she calmed down a bit, took a deep breath, and went back outside to play, immediately seeming to forget there ever was a mishap as she gleefully hurdled herself back onto the trampoline.

"Does mommy walk around touching people's privates?"

No - Do I walk around touching people's privates? - No - That's right. We don't do that because we'd get in trouble. Well, that's not the only reason, but that's good enough for now... -

"Think before you touch."

I'll be the first to admit that I've said some pretty ridiculous things in my time as a mother and given some strange advice disguised as gibberish, but I also know when I slip up and say something teetering on the edge of reason and I'll tell ya folks, this is one of those times. I mean, it's genius - it's simple and clear and downright easy to remember. We've all said or heard, at some point in our lives, things like, "Think before you speak," or "Think before you act," but I never thought it would be necessary, by any means, to tell someone that they should take a moment and contemplate whether or not their decision to put their fingers on something would be a wise or a foolish one. But, alas, I had given birth to a boy who would touch absolutely anything, no matter how fragile, sticky, heavy, or disgusting it might be. The proverbial last straw came when we were in the Bahamas. Yes I know, that was only about a month ago and said child just turned 10 so the speed with which this insight came would not win me any awards. But the magnitude of its influence on his future well-being far outweighs the speed with which it arrived. Or at least that's what I choose to believe. So there we were, he and I on the last day of our vacation, taking the sheets off his bed and cleaning up, when it happened...when he touched something that stunned me for a second and left me speechless for even longer. I just stood there looking from him to the offending entity in disbelief, then managed to say something like, "Why would you touch that?!" He, of course, could give no response that would even remotely make me feel any better about what he put his beautiful, innocent, clean hand on. Soon I saw in his eyes the realization of what he had just done and so I proceeded to offer the above words I hoped he would live by for the rest of his life. Yes, it was that gross. As we lifted the bottom sheet off the bed he had been sleeping on for the past 10 days we saw a rather large reddish stain near the upper middle part of the bed, on the side he had slept on. I instantly recognized it as dried blood and immediately made that observation known by saying something like, "Ew, that's dried blood!" My son, for reasons still unknown to me, proceeds to put his hand on the bloodstain and move it around as if to actually be able to feel its presence on his fingertips. And that's what it took for me to have a heart-to-heart with this young man about the importance of thinking before placing one's hands on anything. Then I sent him straight to the bathroom to wash his hands three times. The question of why there was a huge dried blood stain on the bed didn't even occur to me until after we left...

"Well...you can blow and suck."

Ooh, you could just feel the pain in his voice as my husband said these words to our daughter the other day. And the anguished look on his face afterwards screamed out, "I didn't want to say that! I didn't! I feel dirty now." I hadn't really been paying attention to what they were doing - I was busy going through boxes in the garage looking for yard sale items. I happened across a folder full of old papers from college and was, at the moment when I heard the words no parent ever wants to hear uttered to their child, engrossed in an essay analyzing the underlying meaning behind the short story by Samuel Clemens entitled, "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County." Riveting. Anyway, I knew my husband had just found his old harmonica - I heard its lovely melody in the background - so I knew that what he said he must have said out of pure necessity and explanation. (although, i must admit, it took me a good 2 seconds to sort out in my head why he was saying such things). So I did what any good wife should do in that type of situation, I laughed. And then I nodded my head, assuring him that he was not, indeed, a pervert, just a good dad trying to explain in easy-to-understand kid terms how to play a harmonica.

"How did lettuce get on your head?"

An innocent question, although I knew there really was no answer. Questions like that come out of my mouth all the time. Honestly, I should certainly know better. But to my defense, we were sitting here, at an airport restaurant waiting for our delayed flight to materialize, when it just slipped out. By the way, we're still here, at the airport, now waiting to see just how much longer our flight can can be detained. We're at about 2.5 hours now, which puts us arriving approximately 72 minutes after our connecting flight leaves. Hmm. Good thing we're in no hurry to get home. No work tomorrow and we've been relaxing in the Bahamas for the past 10 days and are still on 'island time.' No complaints here, believe me. I'll just sit back and wait. And hope the kids remain as laid back as they are now for the next 12 hours, or however long it takes to walk through our front door.

"Mommy, my pee pee turned black."

Wha...what?! What does that mean? I don't even know what to say to that. Did I hear you correctly? Did you just calmly say to me that your penis somehow turned black? Like a fungus? Or you got marker on it? Or you managed to bruise it (is that even possible?!)? All of the previous thoughts came streaming through my brain the instant I heard my almost 10 year old say these extrememly strange and disturbing words to me. I was brushing my hair and he was peeing in the toilet (not sure why I felt the need to specify that part). I froze for a second and just murmured something like, "Um...what did you say?" He repeated his statement and added that it looked like there were fuzzies on it too. OH!!! Now it makes sense - he had just gotten new underwear earlier in the day, black ones, and had been playing outside. Whew, I felt soooo much less freaked out. I explained what it probably was and he just shrugged and said, "Oh, okay," and walked out of the bathroom. I was glad we had gotten to the bottom of what could have been a most perplexing situation. But then I started wondering why he wasn't the least bit shocked...