Spin, Spin, Spin

My 5 year old is going to be an attorney. I had hoped for a nobler profession for her, but at least she isn't going to be a politician... In any case, she doesn't know what an attorney is, but I am pretty sure that is what she is going to be.

I say this because of an incident that happened recently in her Kindergarten class. (By the way, does Kindergarten need to be capitalized? I am not really sure but I always do it anyway. I think it's because of the spelling. It seems like a fancy foreign word and therefore out of respect it must be capitalized. It's sort of like British people. Because of their accents they just sound smarter than Americans. A British person could say any damn fool thing and I would just nod, amazed at their brilliance. However, if someone from Tennessee says the same thing, I would just assume they were morons. It's the accent. One conjures up images of James Bond and the other conjures up Jeff Foxworthy.) Bronte (my 5 year old) can read. Her teacher passed out some papers for the kids to work on and then proceeded to show the class what to do with them while writing the directions on the white-board. Bronte watched her and started to work. Josh (a boy at her table) did not watch and had no clue what to do. So, he turned to Bronte and said, "What are we supposed to do?" Bronte pointed at the white-board and said, "Read the directions." Josh looked at the white-board and then turned to Bronte and said, "What are we supposed to do?" Bronte said, "Josh, just read the directions!" Josh stated, "I can't read." At this point, Bronte lost her cool and spat, "What the hell, Josh!"

Because she is her mother's daughter, of course her teacher was right behind her. (I say this because whenever I yell at my kids in a public place, my minister is right behind me. Now that I say that, I'm starting to think my minister is a stalker.) Okay, so Bronte is totally busted at this point, but her teacher thinks it's kind of funny and wasn't going to make a big deal out of it. BUT, NO!! Bronte looked up, saw her teacher and started to explain that she wasn't saying a bad word....that the word "hell" actually refers to a place. And not just any place, a place that they talk about in the Bible. She told her teacher that I use that word all the time, sometimes even in church, so it's not a bad word.

Now her teacher was aware of two things.
1. Bronte knew full well that she swore.
2. Bronte's mother (me) goes around saying "What the hell" all the time and apparently has no problem justifying it by saying it is a Biblical reference.

Guess who got a phone call from the teacher that afternoon?

She also spends an inordinate amount of time telling her teacher that calling their morning gathering "circle time" is technically incorrect because they are sitting in more of an oval shape, or that their Thanksgiving Pow Wow was just wrong because the Pilgrims and the Indians (the kids were dressed up as one or the other) would never have sat around a campfire together singing songs, or that since she (Bronte) had already gotten in trouble and was never going to get a "good behavior" sticker that day, just how bad did she have to be to get an "Uh Oh" note from the teacher instead because she wanted to go home with something.