Slap the ugly right out of your mouth...

I guess I was raised a little too old school. Come to Jesus meetings were always threatened because rude nasty ill behaved children could always benefit from having the fear of God instilled in them. There was one phrase from my childhood that always incited fear "Do we need to go have a little talk..." - there was no talking involved, it was a total hand to butt conversation and my butt NEVER liked to hear what mama's (or daddy's) hand had to say.

I am finding that there are many parents in my peer group who must have been raised by wolves for they seem to have no problem raising children who are ill mannered and just plain nasty. I find this reprehensible on many levels.

One such child plays on my sons soccer team. This child is rude and nasty and I find myself biting my tongue and holding back rage whenever I am around him. Granted this child is a good athlete, would I say he is "gifted" probably not, but certainly a good athlete. I would certainly say he is a better soccer player than my son (which for any mother is a hard thing to admit because we all know our children are "perfect"). Where I first encountered the nastiness lurking beneath the surface of this child is when the boys played a 4 vs. 4 tournament fundraiser back in April. At first I thought perhaps this kid was pretty justified in being irritated with Quinn. Quinn certainly was slacking off out there but at the time I didn't realize it was related to his injured knee and the tumor we later found in his femur. Of course Quinn wasn't giving it his all, he was in pretty intense pain and running made it worse. When this kid walked by my son (who was sitting on the sidelines fighting back tears because his knee was swollen and in pain) and had the audacity to start ragging on how much Quinn sucked I bit my tongue back on what I wanted to say and very politely said "I am sorry that you are upset that you guys lost the game and I am sure Quinn wishes he could have played harder but as you can see he is injured and if you will excuse us we have a Dr's appt to get to" - Of course what I wanted to say was "you little bastard have a little compassion for your teammate here who is limping and almost in tears". When we then found out the extent of the knee issues and found out Quinn is at a higher risk of breaking his leg than most kids this rotten little bastard came up to Quinn and threatened to kick his leg in the tumor because he hoped it would break his leg and Quinn wouldn't be able to play soccer. That was it...guantlet down. I approached the coach, explained my concerns, when the coach said to me "Well he has a twisted sense of humor like that...blah, blah, blah..." I almost lost it. Who on earth raised this child? What world does he live in? Was he raised in the ghetto were a "cap in the ass" is a way of life? I was floored! I would never allow my children to treat others like that. It isn't funny to pick on others for any reason. However the event that really lit my hair on fire happened today. The boys had a soccer clinic and when I went to pick up Quinn from the clinic the first thing Quinn did was to tell me about how awesome his day was. In the course of telling me the story Quinn went so far as to praise this evil horrid child on his mad soccer skills. Of course the kid was standing nearby and instead of saying "thanks" or just letting it roll this kid says "Shut up Quinn, I am right here stupid" and his mother who was standing there said nothing. NOTHING! Ohhhh I wanted to smack the ugly right out of that childs mouth. For Gods sake Quinn was totally praising this kids awesome skill on whatever drill they did and he couldn't even be gracious? And his mother...just standing there and letting her child talk ugly and rude like that. What the hell? You better believe if I caught any of my children being rude like that they would have been seriously embarrassed as I smacked their butt and told them to apologize right there in front of God and country.

If rudeness comes with the kinder gentler approach to raising children I want no part of it. Thank you very much. I will stick with my old school methods and keep up with the "go cut me a switch" mentality. The world is a better place when kids are taught to "do unto others..." - who knew that basic rule of happiness was so outdated.

Anyhow-here's to all of ya'll who survived the "come to Jesus" childhood and are going through life kicking it old school. Ya'll rock and just remember, our kids kick ass.