The Lie

It was the summer of 1988.  We were living in the midwest and I’d just given birth to my third baby.  She joined her brother and sister, who were three and not quite two years old.  You might say I had my hands full.  The event I’m about to share is what led to the lie my children still talk about today.

For some insane reason, I decided I needed to go to the store on that fateful day.  I loaded the children into their car seats.  They were wedged so tightly on the backseat of the red Chevy Cavalier that when you closed the door they all bumped together.  We got to the store without incident and began to shop. I don’t remember what we were after, but at some point the melt down came and I knew I needed to get them out of the store.  But I had three children and God had only seen fit to give me two arms.

The baby was too small to hold her head up, so she got first priority in one arm.  My 23 month old son could walk, but he had forgotten how.  He was in the other arm.  The three year old chose this time to develop of case of spaghetti legs and eventually fall in a heap as we exited the store.  I did the only thing I could do.  I reached down with the hand that was holding her brother and grabbed her hand.  I then pushed/scooted/kicked her rebellious little body to the car.  So there I was with a baby in each arm, and a screaming three year old being drop-kicked across the parking lot.  I’m surprised I wasn’t made poster child for Planned Parenthood.

Something had to be done.  Somehow I had to impress these children.  That’s when the Lie was born.

The next time we headed out I found a really good grease spot in the parking lot.  I think someone had driven over some discarded fast food.  I took my children over and had them look at it.  This, I solemnly told them, was what happened to little children who didn’t walk properly and hold their mother’s hand in parking lots.  They were smashed flat and left nothing but a grease spot.  We looked around and found several more.  It was a fearsome and wondrous moment in their lives.

The story was repeated when the next two children came along.  All of them remember it to this day.  When they got older they would sometimes jump from smashed child to smashed child as we walked into a store.  Little ghouls. Now they recall it with nostalgic smiles.  As a grandmother I can’t wait to see if it is passed on to the next generation.