While I was getting ready to leave for my run today I saw a little ID card my dad has for his work with his picture and name on it. I picked it up and smiled and said, "That's my DAD!"
You ever get weirdly proud of your parents for no reason? Well..."no reason" isn't really accurate. I have every reason to be proud of my parents. But...why would looking at an ID card trigger that?
I guess it's because I never see my parents outside of our house very much. I don't see them in the "real world". So for them to be acknowledged outside of the house...I don't know. But I took a picture of it! Good job, parents!
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I don't pretend to have a big influence over the kids I watch over during the day. Like, I might be remembered by some of them when they're my age. But I don't think I'm teaching them any important life lessons or anything. Which is fine. It's supposed to be mindless summer fun, not an enrichment program.
BUT!
I get my moments in.
Today we were eating snack and a girl I'm sitting at a table with goes, "Can I get another juice box?"
And without thinking I go, "Nope. It's not Double Juice Thursday."
"What's Double Juice Thursday?"
"Every Thursday that occurs on a date that's a prime number. Double Juice Thursday."
And maybe. just maybe. The kids are going to associate Prime numbers for the rest of their life with Double Juice Thursday. One of those kids might get really into advanced math. He becomes one of those people who are trying to find the largest prime numbers and he can't quite remember why but every night when he's up late, crunching numbers and running programs and what not, he's crushing juice box after box. Just slamming down the j's.
Or the day before yesterday we were playing floor hockey and two of the older kids were talking to me over at the sidelines and one of them hits the other in the crotch with the stick and I yelled out, "NUT CHECK!"
And the kid with the stick goes, "Wait...what did you say?"
And I go, "That's a nut check."
It was definitely a lightbulb moment for both of them. The other kid goes, "Nut check...butt check! Arm check! Head check! Neck check!"
I'm pretty sure they already knew people getting hit in the groin is funny. But thanks to me they've reached that next level of calling out something when someone gets hit in the groin. And that's gonna last them at least through high school and probably for the rest of their life.
The last one...I'm not so sure it will have a positive influence but it will probably make a difference. There's one pretty quiet kid who likes to keep to himself a lot and so just for my own amusement I go out of my way to talk to him whenever I see him.
It'll be 90 degrees outside and he'll be wearing jeans so I'll go up to him and say, "I see you're wearing pants today. I approve. You know what I'm going to start calling you? Doctor Magnificent."
And he just kinda looks at me...then looks away from me...trying to act like I'm not there.
But, best case scenario: That kid is going to grow up to never wear shorts again and drive around in a retired school bus full of speakers and smoke machines. Basically, he's going to own the Magic Bus and he'll just drive around to basketball courts in the park, blasting early 90s hip hop. He steps out of his van and a thick cloud of smoke engulfs the entire court and slowly he emerges from the mist. He's got thick black rings around his eyes, wearing a doctors coat covered in motor oil and blueberry pie, wearing cowboy boots. "Protect Ya Neck" is blasting in the background and he strides up to the baddest dude at the park and says, "I'm writing you a prescription for a new staircase. Cuz a Scrawny Punk like you can't STEP TO ME!
Feeling mad hostile, ran the apostle,
Flowing like Christ when I speaks the gospel!
Protect ya neck!
Doctor Magnificent is out!"
And then he peels out of the parking lot and goes to a Mexican supermarket where they give him free ice cream that's about to go bad.
Yeah...actually. I think that kid got the best deal of all.
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