When you are in third grade, life is a soap opera. Everything is a major event and emotions can change at the drop of a hat. I know this because I was once a third grader. And, lucky me, I am revisiting this because I have a third grader.
It amazes me that I can embarrass The Third Grader by showing up at his school to drop off a note but he is allowed to break into "Sassy Psy" and march across the room like a cartoon character swinging his arms and swaggering like a fool. That is not embarrassing when you are nine. Our perceptions are apparently much different.
For instance, our thoughts on how embarrassing farts are seem to be quite different. Let me back up. The other day The Third Grader stomped off the bus angrily and informed me that he was not cool, no girls liked him and all he had to wear was 'raggedy' clothes. Holy crap, I'm in trouble. Puberty hasn't even begun. And, he's a boy. I've already got a 3 year old girl who wants to wear high heels and is obsessed with tutus and the color purple. When her friends leave our house she throws her tiny body to the ground and wails "I'll never see them agaaaaaaain!!" How much more dramatic can we get?
He also told me that someone said his breath smelled like bacon and eggs. I'm guessing this was not a compliment, even though in the world of nine year old boys, it could be a positive....you never know. I did ask him if that happened early in the day...like after breakfast. No, it was at 3:00. Well, I'm stumped.
Anyway. I tried to explain to him that he is young and these things are not going to matter in a few years, blah-biddy-blah-blah-blah. He wasn't buying it. I took a different approach. I decided to try and relate with his shamefully bad breath and sorry clothing selection.
We all get embarrassed! Once I was in seventh grade and I farted in front of the whole class! They didn't stop talking about it for weeks! I sneezed three times and then BAM cut one. Everyone around me slid their desks away from me at the same time. It was like a bomb had dropped!
He sits there for a minute and thinks. Then he starts laughing. And he says:
Once I farted in class and it was super loud. Everyone just thought it was a tummy gurgle because it was right after lunch. And then I did it again and someone said "Hey, was that a tummy gurgle?" It was not smelly so no one knew.
He is both cracking himself up and bursting with pride at his cleverness and ability to fart in public without getting caught. This is the boy who holds farting contests when his friends come over and who also dives under the covers to catch a whiff and critique his brother's gaseous fumes.
So, yes, we have different feelings on what is embarrassing. But, it's good to know that I can still keep him in line by threatening to stand at the bus stop in my pajamas and curlers, holding a coffee cup. I'll always have that.
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