Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Deer in the Headlights

Generally speaking, I don't swear except maybe when I stub my toe really hard or in certain painful or stressful situations. I've always thought that chronic swearers are only exhibiting their lack of creativity and small vocabulary.

That being said, a couple of months ago the whole family was in the car at night (I was driving) and we were on a 20 mile drive home on a country highway. My headlights were on low beam and I was driving along chatting with my husband in the passenger's seat when all of a sudden there were 3 deer in the middle of the road. As you know, by the time you realize deer are in your low beams, they're pretty close to the car. I swerved to miss them and said "oh shit" because they startled me and I envisioned slamming into a herd of deer, blood and guts flying everywhere, expensive car damage, and possibly expensive family damage. I thought the sentiment was appropriate.

We didn't hit the deer because I swerved quickly enough (thank goodness), so after everyone calmed down the kids started teasing me about swearing. Ever since then they've been teasing me relentlessly, making snide remarks about it and, whenever we see deer in a field or on TV or anywhere else the kids always ask me, "mom, what are you supposed to say when you see a deer?!"

So yesterday I drove the kids to school because the temp was below zero and I didn't want them walking in the cold. There's still tons of snow here and the roads are really slippery from the compacted snow. We got to the stop sign right at the school and when I stepped on the brake to stop, the car started sliding. I did the requisite turn-into-the-direction-you're-sliding, but we just kept sliding and ended up doing a 180. Of course "oh shit" slipped out of my mouth as we're careening around in a circle with other cars behind me.

So what does my youngest (and most sarcastic) child say as we're spinning on the ice?

"Hey mom, where's the deer?"

What a smart aleck.

7 comments:

Angie Ledbetter said...

LOL. Draw that out as a cartoon!

Unknown said...

LOL! Kids!

Great Story!

Small Footprints
http://reducefootprints.blogspot.com

Suldog said...

Quick kid, and cool under fire!

Anonymous said...

I swear all the time. I think it horrifies my kids so much that they in turn don't swear. ( around me) However when a friend will accidently swear in front of one of the kids, they turn to me horrified and apologize. I always tell them to watch their fucking language in front of my kids. Then we all have a good laugh. What I mean is, words have such power. I like to think we can diffuse them. As long as your kids have humor and kindness I think they'll always be OK. Yours sound great!
Oh yeah, and deers are jerks! Very cute, but still such attitude hanging out in the road! I mean really.

Anonymous said...

Your so Great! Thanks, it was my first try at a poem. I promised myself I would try to write something new every week. Something I had never tried before or a genre that was new to me. Of course I'll still be whining and posting You Tubes that amuse me too. Have no fear silliness will continue!

I'll be following. Your very good.

Kathryn Magendie said...

LAUGHING!

Sand-in-stone said...

LOL! I love it! Yep. We get caught every time... the kids NEVER forget, nor will they let you forget. Hang in there.

I love your blog.