I try to behave myself.  Honestly, I do.

But there are times when something bubbles up out of my core that’s so instinctual I have absolutely no hope of preventing it.  I don’t know if it’s the teacher in me or the mama or just the human being who doesn’t like to put up with shit, but I’m pretty sure some day it’s gonna get me in trouble.  Not calling-for-bail trouble, but the kind that might involve a stranger screaming at me in public isn’t out of the realm of possibility.

What could I be doing that would invoke such a strong response?  Well, I’ve noticed people can be a little squirrelly about their kids (hello pot, meet kettle), and it’s usually in this arena that I find words inexplicably popping out of my mouth.

Like the time we were wrapping things up at a get-together.  It was late, the food was almost packed up, and parents were herding children like cats in an attempt to get them to the car. Things were moving at a glacial pace (as they tend to do when the little people have been running wild and consuming sugar for three hours) so I was doing my best to help where I could.

I was in the kitchen with someone when her preschool sweet pea came barreling into the house like a bat out of hell.  She made a beeline for her mom and began demanding fudge.  (I’m sure you can guess how well I do with “demanding” children in this type of situation.)  There was just the briefest of pauses – the mom was literally holding the tupperware of fudge in her hand so we couldn’t exactly say it was gone – and then words were pouring fast and furious from my lips.

I looked that little girl in the eye and rattled off (in a super perky voice I didn’t even know I had), “Oh, I’M SO SORRY, but the fudge went to sleep at 8:00 and it’s [pointedly looked at my watch] 8:15 already, it’s snoozing away in there so we can’t open the lid.  But I’m sure it’ll be ready for you to eat in the morning!!”  She blinked at me twice before walking away.  Done.

Did I step on her mom’s toes?  I’m not sure, but I was sure she didn’t need that preschooler eating fudge after 8:00pm when she was already spinning like a top.  What happened the next morning is anybody’s guess.

Then there was the time our family was waiting in line at the water park.  We’d struck up a conversation with a woman and her two sons behind us.  Her boys were young – a rising kindergartener and second grader, I think – and they were acting up.  Well, they were acting like brothers who’d been in a water park all day and were waiting in a very long line with just their mom to wrangle them.  You can draw your own conclusions.

BrightSide and I were doing our best to help, asking the kids questions while T-man and Bear talked about their own hobbies, but they say boys will be boys and I guess brothers will push buttons because those two would not stop picking.  We’d have three minutes of normal conversation punctuated by her authoritative “Stop it!”  Then there’d be another few minutes of talking interrupted by “I mean it!  Stop!!”

Eventually we reached the point of strategic child placement (one child on each side of the mom), but even that didn’t solve the problem.  When she’d be talking with us one would push or poke the other.  And when she was scolding one of them, she had her back turned to the child who was retaliating.

Now really, y’all, I took it as long as I could.  Truly.  I watched this woman try to contain her two boys for at least twenty incredibly long minutes without doing a thing, but finally something in me snapped.  She was outnumbered by these delinquent munchkins.  And she was working with incomplete information, like how every time she crouched down to fuss at the younger one, the older boy would take a step toward them and reach out to poke once the coast was clear.

I talked myself off the cliff several times but finally, when she was talking to her younger son and the older boy was moving in for yet another pinch, my resolve broke.  I reached out, touched his arm, and shook my head.

Did I overstep?  Probably.  But apparently I was physically unable to watch this poor woman struggle to control two young boys for one moment longer.  (fyi – He didn’t pinch his brother.)

You see how this could land me in hot water, right?  So far things have worked out okay, but with my luck one of these days I’ll say something in front of one of those mamas who think their kid hung the moon and then all bets will be off.

Maybe I should be putting away that bail money, just in case.