A Bright Future

GQ, Little Bub, my grandma and I were all eating dinner when a comment was made about how smart he is. Somehow the conversation turned to what you are going to be when you grow up and if everyone has a boss.

"Do people at McDonald's have a boss?" says GQ.

"Yes, everyone has a boss, even people at McDonald's," I told him.

"Well I want to work at McDonald's and how will I know who my boss is because everyone wears the same shirt?"

WHAT?? He wants to work at McDonald's? He couldn't say a fireman or a cowboy or a football player like most 5 years olds? An astronaut maybe?

"No, you don't want to work at McDonalds! Only when you're a teenager or maybe while in college."

"Maybe at the gas station then?"

Awesome. This is not exactly a parent's dream. The children I was a nanny for made a very interesting observation regarding gas station employees. We were playing tag in the house when the little boy and I ran into each other and I fell head first into the hardwoods. I asked if I was missing a tooth.

"No, but if you were then you'd have to start working at the gas station!" he replied. Very observant.

We tried our best to convince him of other job possibilities. In the end he came to me and whispered in my ear that really, he would truly like to work at Kasey's Gas Station. On his progress report the only thing he scored low on was recoginizing the sound that went with the letter. I was going to buy flash cards for him this weekend to work on it, but I guess now there's no need. I can't be like a normal parent and say "if you don't get good grades you're going to end up flipping burgers for a living!" because that is already his goal. Sigh . . . .

All jokes aside, being a foster parent has taught me that things parents do to their children that are criminally wrong are not the only type of wrongdoing they're engaging in. My last kids were very paranoid and distrustful of everyone because their parents were conspiracy theorists. Everyone was to blame for their life troubles but them. This obviously made school and peer interaction difficult. Is it a crime to doom your child to failure and a lifetime of bouncing from job to job, mostly likely bottom of the barrel jobs? Nope, not technically. But I can't tell you how sad it is to look into a child's face and know that there is no hope for them because of their parents. I worked with a parent that was just a downright crappy parent and I felt terrible for the sweet little girl. When I tried to express my concerns to this parent, their response was "well, she's alive isn't she? It can't be that bad." Hmm, I didn't know that merely being alive was the standard for a child's wellbeing until now. People say you learn so much as a parent, but I hope I don't learn those types of lessons!

I guess I have a long way to go until I get there. 6 weeks today! I am halfway to the point of being able to breathe a sigh of relief. If you want (and don't do it if you don't want to) you can scroll down to the bottom of the blog to see what my little monkey looks like today!!

I really, REALLY need to go to my ultrasound. Only 6 days to go . . . . .