The Art of Embarrassing Your Children

A few days ago, my daughter and I were talking about our upcoming trip and she was talking about meeting kids to play with and so, I started to paint a picture for her.  The family on the beach, other kids her age nearby, me cuddling and kissing her, calling her monkey-butt and tickle-butt and various other names, playing tickle monster and World Federation Baby Wrestling, followed by our verions of "So, You Think You Can Dance?", and then, the culmination, me kissing her dad in front of everyone.

"Mom, you have totally lost your kid memory", she said. "That would be just evil to me if you did that."

"What is kid memory", I asked her.  "You know", she said.  "It's like when adults forget how to be a kid, or what it was like to be a kid."

Ahhh...my Kid Memory.  Yes, on some level the years have blunted the impact of those moments thrust upon me by both parents and siblings alike...the rough edge of mortification and the drowning feeling that it was just going to keep getting worse.... but not so much that we as parents don't get quite a bit of joy out of heaping it upon our children..probably too much sometimes if truth will out.

The whole topic came up again last night while she and I were reading in bed.  She decided that the only books she was going to take on our trip were books that would remind me about Kid Memory--her logic being that if she reminded me every day I wouldn't do anything to embarrass her.  Silly, silly girl.  I feel for her, really I do.

But beyond that, I have to admit that her list of books is practically perfect--and here are her "Top 5":

5.  Ramona and Beezus

4.  Fudge, SuperFudge, DoubleFudge

3.  Junie B. Jones (any of them)

2.  Babymouse:  Queen of the World

1.  The Penderwicks and The Penderwicks on Gardam Street

So, here is to my daughter and her dream of an embarrassment-free childhood.  I wonder what she'll say when I tell her that to me, these books are just ideas waiting to happen?