On Fibbing...
to one's children in particular.
I have many faults when it comes to parenting, too many to be going into here, but I have always said that I would never lie to my children - even to the extent that we have made it clear that Father Christmas is a fun story but nothing more. Boy, did we lose brownie points with the twin's class teacher for that! But there's a story for another day.
Thus it is with some sadness that I confess that I have just told Lily a barefaced lie.
Lily loathes spiders, she completely freaks out - tears, gasping for breath, the whole shebang so when she came hurtling down the stairs this evening shrieking that a gigantic spider was tucked away in the dressing-up box, I had to go and fish the wretched arachnid out and give it the old heave-ho into the night.
Could I find Shelob? Could I hang...
So there's Lily about to go for a Grade A hissy fit and swearing that she was going to sleep with the dog as there was no way she was going upstairs while there was a monster at large. I am not the most patient person, but I can see reason when it comes to phobias - I'd be the same if there was a beetle up there - but Shelob had gone to earth and I could not find her.
Problem.
Now, the girls know that I never kill spiders and a large and twitchy body is always examined with interest by the other two while Lily implores us not to bring it near her. So I did the only thing I could think of.
I went to my craft cupboard and snipped a tidy sized chunk of black feather into my handy-dandy spider catcher and presented it as Shelob captured. A blatant lie. Shelob is probably up in the rafters biding her time. But Lily will be asleep so she'll never know. That is, I hope she'll never know.
I have many faults when it comes to parenting, too many to be going into here, but I have always said that I would never lie to my children - even to the extent that we have made it clear that Father Christmas is a fun story but nothing more. Boy, did we lose brownie points with the twin's class teacher for that! But there's a story for another day.
Thus it is with some sadness that I confess that I have just told Lily a barefaced lie.
Lily loathes spiders, she completely freaks out - tears, gasping for breath, the whole shebang so when she came hurtling down the stairs this evening shrieking that a gigantic spider was tucked away in the dressing-up box, I had to go and fish the wretched arachnid out and give it the old heave-ho into the night.
Could I find Shelob? Could I hang...
So there's Lily about to go for a Grade A hissy fit and swearing that she was going to sleep with the dog as there was no way she was going upstairs while there was a monster at large. I am not the most patient person, but I can see reason when it comes to phobias - I'd be the same if there was a beetle up there - but Shelob had gone to earth and I could not find her.
Problem.
Now, the girls know that I never kill spiders and a large and twitchy body is always examined with interest by the other two while Lily implores us not to bring it near her. So I did the only thing I could think of.
I went to my craft cupboard and snipped a tidy sized chunk of black feather into my handy-dandy spider catcher and presented it as Shelob captured. A blatant lie. Shelob is probably up in the rafters biding her time. But Lily will be asleep so she'll never know. That is, I hope she'll never know.