The Obedient Child

Some kids are more obedient than others.  Trust me; raising three boys, I know this stuff.  I have one that is hell bent on defiance with a flair, usually drawing great applause from whatever audience he has, and another one that is hell bent on defiance not just for the outlandishness of it all, but to put on a good show adding a great punchline at the end evoking side splitting laughter. I suppose part of this flair added to the defiance is to somehow keep Mom from murdering them in cold blood. Then there is the obedient child.  He can be rebellious, don’t misunderstand.  He also has a stubborn streak a mile wide, but of the three, when he was younger, before his full blown defiance set in with a vengeance he was the most obedient of the three of these characters I call my sons.

It’s not that he was perfect.  You can bet if his two older brothers were into something he wasn’t too far behind them, but the age difference seemed to help keep him out of more serious transgressions than it did them.  Every now and then though my obedient child would find himself grounded.  This was absolute torture for the youngest child who wanted nothing more than to tag along with his older brothers who constantly told him “you’re too little”.  Those three words just seem to make a kid all the more anxious to participate. 

On one such occasion my obedient child found himself grounded and his brothers were about to go off on another adventure.  In addition to being told once again that “you’re too little” by them, the ‘mean ol’ mom’ also said he couldn’t go.  This really upset my obedient child.  He stomped off into his room and gathered a few of his treasures and went out the front door slamming it behind him. 

His brothers were out on the front porch, but when I heard the door slam I promptly stopped doing whatever it was I was doing and went after this obedient cild of mine.  He was about half a block down the street.  I said “Where do you think you are going?”  He turned and spitefully replied, “I’m running away and you can’t stop me!”  I said his full name “you get back here right now!” he in turn said ‘NO!”  I'm pretty sure he meant that with every fiber of his being... for the first time in his entire life he was really talking back to Mom.

My hilarious outlandish child reminded me that my obedient child was supposed to be grounded as he and my defiant child were about to crack up on the porch, of course they thought the whole thing was funny.  You can only imagine how humorous the two clowns in the porch swing thought this was.  I then yelled to my obedient child who had turned his back and once again started down the street… “You get back here right now mister… did you forget you’re grounded and not supposed to leave this yard?” I yelled from the front steps.  Mr. Outlandish and Mr. Defiant piped in and both said, “Yeah! You’re grounded!” while elbowing each other and trying not to laugh.

My poor little obedient child, remembering he was grounded was now defeated.  What else could he do? The poor little guy just turned around and came back home. 

My obedient child will hear "You can't run away... you're grounded!" from his two brothers as long as he lives.

This is the pay off for being the obedient child.