I got a call from Lovely Wife this morning. I usually do and my morning isn't really started until I get one. This particular call had one of those spooky beginings that sounded suspiciously like "Do you know what your son did?" Those are the worst calls since you're effectively powerless. If whatever your son (not hers, at least at this particular moment) did makes you furious you're shit out of luck. You're at work buddy and by the time you get home it's ancient history. Of course since you're a grown up you've festered on it for the entire day and when you do get home you try to do the corrective counseling thing but by that time the kid doesn't even remember what it was that he did and your oh-so-carefully crafted and mentally rehearsed speech falters and dies on your lips when confronted by stupefyingly honest childhood ignorance.

If whatever the boy did doesn't happen to irritate you or (God forbid) you don't think it was such a bad thing anyway you are equally screwed. You are on the phone with a woman who is so pissed she has temporarily disowned her child. You. Must. Agree. With. Her. Not doing so, and doing so in colorful and excited terms I might add, will allow her to transfer that rage from the son to the father. That's you, remember. This is a bad thing. You always want to place children between yourself and your spouse's rage, never the other way around. Hey, that's the basic reason you had the little beggars in the first place. Fortunately, although the beginning of the phone call sounded frighteningly like a "Do you know" call, it turned out to be something completely different.

The phone rings and I turn happily from my keyboard to answer it. I see from the caller ID that it is my Lovely Wife.

Me: Good morning my Lovely Wife whom I adore more than life itself! What can I do to make your day more precious, as precious perhaps as our ever burdgeoning love?

Okay, I'm paraphrasing a bit.

Lovely Wife: Do you have a minute? I want you to hear something that Bear has to say.

That was the spooky "Do you know"-esque line. I immediately got visions of a crying child with snot dripping down his face as he blubbers out a confession of his heinous crimes with halting words through shuddering breaths. You know what I mean - when the behavior is so bad that the mom can't speak about it and she makes the kid tell it himself. I cringe when remembering times I had to do that.

Me: Um, sure.

Lovely Wife: Here he is.

Silence and a bit of fumbling of the phone. Bear takes a deep breath and starts talking.

Bear: I had a Bejus...

Something indistinct as Lovely Wife interrupts him. He takes another breath and he starts again.

Bear: I pledge allegiance, to the flag, of the United States of America...

Rock on! Nobody's in trouble! Not only is nobody in trouble but my boy is reciting the Pledge of Allegiance!

Bear: ...and to the republic for which it stands, one nation...

The moment of truth. Would it be the real pledge or the Cali Court pledge?

Bear: ...under God...

Woo hoo!!

Bear: ...indivisible...

He even got "indivisible" right! I was still getting that wrong two years after I could read it.

Bear: ...with liberty and justice for all.

I don't recall exactly what I said at this point but I definitely let the Bear know how proud I was. I might have been crying...I'm not sure, it was a genuine moment.

And that was how my day started. A bit of tension, a dash of terror and then a whole lot of pride. I could almost give up coffee.

No I couldn't.

Posted by: Jim at 04:32 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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