Parent-Teacher Conference

The craziest thing I ever got into trouble for as a youngster was LISTENING. I know, it's crazy. My parents were horrible. While all other parents are hollering at their kids to used the two ears that the good Lord gave 'em, my parents were punishing me for using mine.

Background information: I am in 2nd grade, and my mother has been called for a parent teacher conference with Ms. Jones (not her real name). My family lives in a really small town in the north west. My father is the plant superintendent at an oil refinery. We eat dinner at the kitchen table EVERY night and talk, talk, talk.

Ms. Jones: Mrs. Mom, Lesley is doing great in her class work. She needs to work a little more on her math facts, and cursive writing, but she's right on track and doing well.

Mrs. Mom: Oh, great. She loves school and we will continue working on these things at home. (blah, blah, blah)

Ms. Jones: By the way, I have a question. How did Lesley find out that I am living with my boyfriend and that we are unmarried?

Mrs. Mom: *gulp* Umm....

Ms. Jones: The reason why I'm asking is because Lesley has been telling all the kids on the playground these things, and we're basically sinners to the worst degree. How would she know that I am living with my boyfriend?

Mrs. Mom: *GULP* (I'm sure that my mother was doing some pretty fancy footwork at this point in the conversation)

Ms. Jones: And, by the way, Lesley has been cussing like a sailor on the playground. She's been using the "F word" in every variation imaginable.

The rest of the dialogue is somewhat unclear because at this point in the "recap" (screaming rant) my mom has completely LOST her cool and is suffering from the most severe case of humiliation imaginable, at the hands of little old me. She was FURIOUS. No wait, that's an understatement. My mother was a red zone case in Cesar Milan's terminology.

And just to clarify - YES, I was totally correct about Ms. Jones. She was living with her boyfriend and they were unmarried. My dad had come home from work one night, was "talking shop" at the dinner table with my mother about a dude at work. How dude's girlfriend was a teacher, her first name was **** (same as my teacher's name), and there were a few other minor details discussed that added up with what I already knew about Ms. Jones. I started connecting the dots...things started falling into place....and VOILA! I had gossip so scandalous and juicy in the world of 8 year olds, that everyone (well, a few friends) were arguing to see who could sit next to me at lunch.

I WAS LISTENING.

Mama Kat's Writer's Workshop

Prompt #4 - The craziest reason I ever got in trouble as a child.

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Open Mouth...Insert Cowgirl Boot

I love the Houston Livestock Show & Rodeo. Oh. Yes. I. Do. I especially love it when hot young hunky men are singing, dancing, and strutting their goods up on stage for my friends and I to ogle at. It's like Santa just delivered a belated Christmas gift to me in mid-March. A really, really great gift if it happens to Keith Urban. Just give me a drool bib and turn your head in the other direction if you can't hang.

Oh wait...that's not the point of this installment. Focus, focus, FOCUS. The point is that sometimes when you are making fun conversation, and you are overcome with your own hilarity, SOMETIMES your wise cracks fall a little to close to home for your listener. Grab a seat cowpoke and hang on to your boots!

Setting: yours truly is sitting in the hairdresser's chair

Mood: fun and chatty

Characters: Moi and the hairdresser, we'll call her "STAR"


The curtain raises....

Star is seen cutting my hair with the speed and ferocity of Edward Scissorhands, and talking at the same speed. She's talking so fast that I have to ask her repeat herself numerous times. I don't know if she's on crack, or just lives on fast forward, but I feel like it's a match up of the tortoise and the hare. So there I sit....hair flying....we're chatting up a storm....and she mentions that she's going to the HLS&R.


Camera zooms in to catch the conversation....

Star: I have a date tomorrow night and we are going to the roooodeo. I haven't ever been to the rodeo in Houston before, so it'll be my first time, and I don't know what to wear. It's so weird.

Me: Oh my gauuu, I love going to the rodeo! Used to hate it, but my sister always gets the best seats and takes me with her. Good seats, plus free tickets? Yeah, you learn to love the rodeo really quickly. Who's playing tomorrow night?

Star: Brad Paisley. I don't listen to country at all, but I have heard that he's really good. I just don't know if I want to go the rodeo, though. Kinda weird place to take a date.

Me: BP will be really good. Haven't ever seen him before but heard that he puts on a good show. The RODEO part is really great to watch too. (insert description of events, my favorite parts of the rodeo, etc, etc) And besides, even if you aren't really a fan of the rodeo it's a GREAT place to people watch.

Star: Oh damn, that's my favorite sport!

Me: Well, then you will love it for sure! It's like someone took one of those trashy Walmart's from one of those back-woodsy, deep East Texas towns like Cut-N-Shoot, you know, where brothers and sisters marry each other, and just dumped it out!

Star: I grew up in Cut-N-Shoot. (BTW, Cut-N-Shoot is a real honest to goodness town here in Texas)

Me: *GULP* Wait. Whaaat?

Star: I grew up there. I hated it so much that I had my Daddy transfer me to ****** High School and drove me every morning, but that's where all of my growing up years were spent.

Me: *awkward silence* Well, you'll have a good time anyway. *subject change*


Camera zooms out. Curtain closes.

True story. No exaggerations. Star just kinda laughed the conversation off and let it go that day. Luckily, when I went back to see her it was evident that she still didn't hold a grudge and she didn't scalp me. Either that, or the fumes from all the chemicals have fried the "Tacky Things That Idiot Clients Have Said To Me" portion of her brain. WHEW!

*****