My pockets are always full and it isn't cash... it's trash. I've got gum wrappers, golf tees, pennies and fortune cookie fortunes; all in my pockets. And it's becoming quite a chore to remember to empty them out each night.
Oh Mom, I do so remember passing my little bits of garbage up to you in the front seat while you drove us to this practice or that person's house or from one party to another school function. I remember handing you crumpled up wrappers and sticky wads of gum. What I didn't consider then and that I know all to well now is that you had no garbage in the front seat of that car and you didn't really have time to make one. So instead you probably did what I do now. You probably stuffed the trash into your travel coffee mug (were travel coffee mugs even invented back then... no seriously, I can't fathom a world without travel coffee mugs). Or maybe you had one of those ash trays that they no longer install in cars. Or perhaps you had left that nice plastic bag on the stick shift after your last oil change. But more likely than not... you stuffed that garbage into your pockets.
Here's what I don't get about being passed car garbage. It's not like the kids pass me all of their garbage (they just think they do). No, there's plenty of garbage left strewn around their seats too. Stuffed into crevices of my backseat there are french fries and crayons, tokens and tickets, wasted stickers and fake tattoos. I cringe when I find the top of one of those sauces from McDonalds. True, they're passing me plenty of garbage... yet somehow they seem to be sitting in their own little landfill back there. And in my defence, it's really too cold out for me to clean out the car right now... maybe over Spring break.
Wherever we go, I leave with tissues, tags, candy wrappers and maybe even small art projects... all stuffed into my pockets. we go many places so I'm always on the look out for garbage cans (yes kids, there is a such thing as garbage cans) to empty my pockets. I'm met there by moms of other children (young and old- I must admit to passing my own Mom garbage even when I see her now today) who are all emptying their pockets into the garbage cans. Sometimes we find stuffed up wads of money that we didn't have time to put away properly... but usually it's those clingy clear straw wrappers from juice boxes.
Don't get me started on the laundry! If I forget to empty out my pockets those tissues become crunchy wads of lint in my pockets glued by snot to faded carnival tickets. Yet oddly, when I empty out the boys' pockets I find... nothing. No garbage. I suppose if anything I feel appreciative that at least they don't have a rock collection or bug carcasses in their pockets but mostly I'm thinking: why don't they just put their own garbage in their own pockets?
In an effort to be productive and not just to whine, I've come up with some solutions for moms who wish to stop this endless cycle of trash in their family:
1) When your child approaches you with garbage, put your hands in the air (out of their reach) and back up.
2) Direct them to the nearest garbage can... or their father.
3) Wear exercise pants (even when you're not exercising) because they have no pockets. Don't give into temptation to start stuffing trash under the elastic waistband.
4) Make your kids empty out your pockets before you do your laundry (a bad idea if you're hiding anything from your kids... like extra change).
5) Stop handing trash to your own mother, thus setting a bad example.
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