Margin for Error (915 hits)
Category: NoneLabels: crap:fiction
Rating: 1.77 on 26 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Circe <fickle.muse.at.gmail.com> (View user info) at 2004-10-01 18:02:42 EDT
"Stop touching me!"
"Mum! He poked me in the eye!"
"You keep putting your eye on my finger!"
They barrelled into the kitchen to demand justice. Kelly looked up from the table where she was carefully snapping bamboo chopsticks into perfect one inch lengths.
Sam looked at his mother for a moment. He was eight; he'd seen a lot (admittedly, most of it on Cartoon Network) but there was nothing in his experience to explain his mother calmly and steadily snapping pieces of wood and lining them up in neat rows. He shook his head. There were more important matters to think about. His six year old sister was being a brat again and he was going to get her sent to her room if he had to sell his soul to do it. ("If I have to sell my soul to do it" was one of his father's phrases; he didn't know what it meant but it sounded suitably badass.)
"Mum! Sarah keeps annoying me. I told her not to play with my toys but she did and she won't stop and it's really annoying, Mum, she breaks stuff and - " Sarah interrupted. Damned if her brother was getting all the airtime. "Mum, all I wanted him to do was let me play races with ONE car and he won't and I just want to play with it because my doll is still wet from when I bathed her in the toilet and - "
Kelly smiled at her children. Their chatter stopped and they watched her expectantly, each waiting to hear the other chastised. Kelly's voice was clear and inflectionless when she spoke: "There is no margin for error here."
Sam frowned. Sarah tilted her head. Kelly snapped off another piece of wood and laid it with the rest. She spoke quickly, quietly, almost in a conspirator's whisper. "They must be aligned. All of them must be straight and true. The alignment is key, the truth is all, and there is no margin for error. See the truth in the pattern..."
Kelly's voice dropped and she mumbled to herself, her eyes returning to the table and the bamboo. She straightened the rows of short wooden sticks and nodded from time to time in satisfaction.
Sam reached out and took his sister's hand. Together they backed out of the kitchen, not looking away from their mother. They watched her warily until they were out of sight and returned to the living room. Their muted, quiet voices reached Kelly.
She grinned and swept the short pieces of wood into the palm of her hand. She stood up, walked to the dustbin, and dropped them in.
She shook her head ruefully. 'The lengths we go to for a bit of peace,' she thought.
User Reviews
Submitted by Fey (user info) at 2007-04-20 15:36:19 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Doodles (user info) at 2006-12-19 19:31:36 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
You would be the best mother ever.
Really.
Submitted by TigerLilly (user info) at 2004-10-27 14:41:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
How did I miss this?
Submitted by Badlands (user info) at 2004-10-04 11:10:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Vivid storytelling. Well done.
Submitted by Coyote (user info) at 2004-10-02 04:17:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I can't wait until my kids are old enough to try this ploy.
Nicely done, as always.
Submitted by Ainkara (user info) at 2004-10-02 03:28:07 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I love you. I might email you later, right now I'm all like... upset and stuff. And this course is driving me fucking insane.
Submitted by AshK (user info) at 2004-10-02 00:17:45 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
ahhh, pure poetry.
My son and his little delinquent pal decided it would be a good idea to throw rocks at the neighbors house today (at his Grandma's). Two holes in the vinyl siding and one visit from the police later, I found out about it. I stared at him until he was hysterically bawling. I feel evil.
Who am I kidding? I feel better and I managed to glare so long I lost a majority of the urge to whomp him. Bad mommy.
Submitted by Bigmike (user info) at 2004-10-01 23:31:16 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
AAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.
If they were my kids and my wife, they would have run to get the video camera, taped her putting the bamboo in straight little lines, made up placards that said things like "My Mom's a lunatic" or "Crazy Lady" or even quite possibly "Help Us!" to videotape in the same picture with her, sent the tape off to "America's funniest home video's", and then called all of her friends to let them know when it would air.
Or they would have just ignored her like they always do.
Submitted by LadyPlural (user info) at 2004-10-01 21:26:35 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I hope you're writing all of these 'bad mommy moments' in a notebook. That way, when your kids are in therapy years from now, they'll have a handy reference.
Submitted by PatheticCapitalistFuck (user info) at 2004-10-01 21:17:04 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Nicely done as always. Wish I could write as well as you.
Submitted by big_wigger (user info) at 2004-10-01 19:15:48 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
pretty good
Submitted by mikethescottish (user info) at 2004-10-01 19:02:17 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I find that it's better to have an old wooden meter rule (which you bought off Ebay), and just flick it into your hand repeatedly whenever your kids annoy you.
That's my uncle, by the way, not me. He's ten times more badass than I could ever hope to be.
Submitted by Monarch (user info) at 2004-10-01 19:02:07 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by KoolMang (user info) at 2004-10-01 18:22:12 (#)
Ranking: 0
Kids aren't burdens, they're bundles of joy!
-------------------------------
Did he actually just SAY that?
Awesome post Circe.
Submitted by Snark (user info) at 2004-10-01 18:35:15 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
"Dad! Dad! Kate is kicking me in the leg"
"Well, move it out of the way"
Never thought of using the insanity ploy. Hmmm....
Submitted by icarus9mm (user info) at 2004-10-01 18:31:13 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
where's the bit about her shoving the bamboo under their fingernails?
i like that part best.
serves the little bastards right.
Submitted by electrictoothsyndrome (user info) at 2004-10-01 18:22:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I have actually used these tactics before! Believe it or...well, I am sure you don't doubt it. :P
Good stuff, Evil Mom!
Submitted by KoolMang (user info) at 2004-10-01 18:22:12 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Kids aren't burdens, they're bundles of joy!
Submitted by corn_nugget (user info) at 2004-10-01 18:21:26 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
You're crazy.
I liked the part where they were inturrupting each other for the mothers attention... and how you described WHAT they wanted- they both assumed the OTHER child would get in trouble. So true! Such a large amount of insight in a common (well, semi-common) experience.
Submitted by Circe (user info) at 2004-10-01 18:17:29 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Thanks, Snark. I love praise from you; you're a kickass guy.
GodChicken - Yeah. They're gonna be totally psychologically screwed. It's way more fun than hitting 'em.
Koolmang - she was talking about the wood on the table. She was feigning a moment of insanity to get the kids to fuck off.
Submitted by DonkeyOnTheEdge (user info) at 2004-10-01 18:15:52 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Spiral_Abraxis (user info) at 2004-10-01 18:14:17 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
One time I shot a nigger child in the face because he was robbing a good white man.
Submitted by KoolMang (user info) at 2004-10-01 18:13:30 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No, it's just how do children make a margin of error when they're simply having a spat?
Submitted by Snark (user info) at 2004-10-01 18:13:00 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Wow that's a ton of story in such a small space. I can't imagine the kids being written any better.
Simply perfectly done.
Submitted by GodChicken (user info) at 2004-10-01 18:11:27 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Your children are going to grow up with a fear of everything redheaded.
And I love you for it.
Submitted by Circe (user info) at 2004-10-01 18:07:23 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
That's fairly unsurprising, Koolmang. I'll remember to use much more simple words next time; it'll be tricky to make a title out of "the", "and", and "to", but I'll try.
Submitted by KoolMang (user info) at 2004-10-01 18:04:15 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
What's a margin of error? I actually read it, and I didn't get it.