Could You Move Any Slower?

It's comments like this that are teaching my son to be sarcastic. I recognize, I own it. I still can't stop myself. I hardly know how to talk without the sarcasm. I mean, what else would I say when it takes him more than 15 minutes to don shoes and a coat to leave the house? I suppose I could yell, "MOVE YOUR ASS!!!", but that's not really very nice is it? No, sarcasm is much more pleasant.

I'm not sure how sarcastic Blackstone was before I met him. My guess is not nearly as sarcastic as he's become. When he kissed me good-bye tonight to go to yet another town meeting and leave me home with the kids, I heard his phone talking in his pocket. You know how it is, sometimes your ass just needs to make a phone call? His phone wasn't in his back pocket, but you get the point.

So I asked, "Calling your girlfriend?"

"You know it, baby," was his response.

Trouble was terribly perplexed, "Dad has a girlfriend?"

"No, he's just being sarcastic," I explained.

Trouble learned all about sarcasm today. Blackstone picked him up from school for the first time and he was on the later side and at the end of the very long line of cars picking up their kids. Trouble was not thrilled to have to stand in the freezing rain and wait. When he got in the car he said, "Thanks for picking me up dad, so I didn't have to stand in the freezing rain."

Then just in case he wasn't being understood, "I'm saying the opposite of what I mean. Get it?"

("Get it?" is one of Trouble's favorite things to say to us. Apparently, he just doesn't think that we understand him.)

"Yes," Blackstone told him. "You call that being sarcastic."

Blackstone explained to me later that as Trouble heard this, his eyes lit up with understanding and delight. I think part of his world just clicked for him.

"You get it from your mother," Blackstone told him. That just has to take some of the joy out of it.

Comments

[madhands]

You are welcome!

[axionia]

Yeah, by all means abandon a great diagnostic theory because it's difficult to prove.