One of my neighbors came to me today with a complaint about my daughter. This neighbor feels that my child has behaved inappropriately and disrespectfully towards her. Here’s the sitch:
My daughter is seven. The neighbor has a daughter of her own about that age. The neighbor is a fairly conservative Christian, probably a member of a Pentecostal denomination like the Church of God in Christ, In which I was raised. Think speaking in tongues, biblical literalism, faith healing, and whatnot. The neighbor’s daughter has a few times invited mine to come to church with them. My daughter has demurred, preferring to spend her Sunday mornings with me or my stepdaughter as is the custom. Today the neighbor child, apparently at her mother’s behest, repeated the invitation and told my daughter that she really needs to go because it is important that she, my daughter, not grow up like me. God is clearly displeased with me, the child said, as my blindness is obviously a sign of divine displeasure. My daughter asked how the neighbors child knew this and was told that the other girl’s mother had told her so. My daughter replied that the mother was full of shit. The other girl, highly displeased, went to her mother, who came to my daughter and told her she needed to rephrase and apologize. My daughter replied “I’m SORRY that you’re full of shit.”
Hence the complaint.
Here are the punishments I am contemplating:
#1: Taking my daughter & her younger brothers out to a restaurant or movie she chooses and allowing her to order anything she wants, repeated once a week from now until Easter and making sure the boys know this is happening because of their big sister;
#2: Doubling her allowance for the rest of the month.
Not the pony, unless you let it poop on the neighbor’s grass. Or save the poop and toss it over at night.
I take that back, get her the pony, and the other two as well. My first thought was the food sich, letting her have all the candy she wants.
Oh, and that part about divine displeasure? They need to learn some real theology. God isn’t like that. Tell them to read the story of Jesus healing the blind man, in the Gospel of John. The Big Guy Himself said the dude wasn’t blind because of sins.
The COGIC Response to that would be that Jesus was not stating a general principle, but rather the specific circumstances of that particular blind man’s life. assuming she the neighbor is that brand of Pentecostal, which I don’t actually know. And I don’t plan to find out, as that would invite entail talking to her.
No yards. We live in an apartment building. Besides, even if we had yards, that plan would entail my having to handle equine excrement. I promise my great-great-great-great grandmother Francine on her deathbed that I would do that as little as possible. There is a sacred story that explains why.
You can’t go to the maximum punishment all at once. If you do, you have no place to go from there. What if I catch her calling Donald Trump a fascist nutjob or something?
If it will make you even happier, I will tell you that upon hearing the neighbor’s complaint, I simply closed the door without comment. There was obviously nothing to be gained in further conversation, and life has enough drama as it is.
Is there any way to publicly shame your daughter, perhaps by making her ride said pony in front of these righteous neighbors so that they can bear witness to the Lord’s divine justice?
In relation to your home, is the offended neighbor adjacent or downstairs? Perhaps your daughter has dreams of becoming a concert violinist? Or learning to tap dance?
