People

Since we homeschool and therefore almost always have the kids with me when I am running errands/otherwise appear in public, I am used to getting the questions/statements: 1) "Are they all yours?" (uhm...yes.) 2) Wow. You must have your hands full. *Note: This statement usually comes out in a tone of voice reserved for when you find excrement on your shoe. (eyeroll - my children can hear you and comprehend that you think they are second class citizens or that their mother has a screw loose - only the latter may be true)

Rather than submit every daftly rude cashier/customer in line somewhere/old lady at the park to a full-tilt soapbox rant, I have formulated some pat answers. In fact, I am sure that probably the oldest 3 could say some of them by now.

They include the truth - 1)Yes. 2)Not yet.

Or if I am feeling particularly cantankerous (which is highly probable), I spout sarcastic answers like 1)They are from my husband's first marriage. 2) (holding my hands up stick-up style for effect) Actually my hands are empty at the moment. Got any kids on sale today?

Ahhhh.... people. This is why my husband leans toward being anti-social.

However, there are times when you interact with people in public who catch you so off-guard you can't even formulate a response.

One of my best friends has super curly hair. Like telephone-cord-curly (if you're, ahem, old enough to remember corded phones) and her 3 year old daughter has the same locks on her tiny little head. One day someone asked my friend if she permed her daughter's hair??? Another time someone asked her if she permed her own hair once she realized her daughter's hair was curly. Seriously. Did no one take high school biology?

Another friend was told by a co-worker that by having her second baby she was contributing to the overpopulation of the world. Wow. Math class anyone? Two parents plus two kids equals more than we started with. Who knew?

Ahhh...people.

But then...redemption:
Leaving our favorite red bullseye-themed store the other evening, I was waiting up front for my Hot Husband to finish paying for our purchase. I had Thing4 in the cart and Thing3 was ducking down next to him, jumping up to surprise him and make him giggle. Adorable brother stuff. My role was simply to make sure that Thing3 didn't play too hard and injure Thing4.

An elderly man on one of the store's electric carts was escorted by his wife to park the machine and in my peripheral vision I noticed they stopped for several minutes. It didn't even occur to me what they were doing until Hot Husband rejoined us and I looked up from their game to see the couple hadn't left the store because they were watching my boys. They were all smiles and made a point to tell us that what they were witnessing was heart melting. (It was...their simple joy, building a relationship, being cute, technically behaving themselves. It brings such joy and I revel in it.)

Thank you, people!