So that’s how it’s gonna be.

Every once in a while your child does or says something so jarring, so unexpected, so revelatory that it’s as if someone took a pair of buttery soft tan leather kid gloves and slapped you across the face with them and screamed “ATTENTION!” in a heavy French accent.  There are certain moments when something happens that brings into screeching focus the fact that your kid is an other, a sentient, cogitative being apart from you.  My guys are still young, so they are always underfoot, kind of like chickens in a barnyard – so much so that you start to not notice them as much.  Until one of them says something that puts you into a goggle eyed, head swiveling, double take.  And then you go, aaaah, right, oh my God, you are hilarious, only I can’t tell you because I’m your mother and I’m not suppose to think this is hilarious because you are only five and if you say shit like this around other mothers, no one will have you over for play dates, so let me just bite my lips and pretend I didn’t quite hear you and continue on our way.

The other day I was meeting my girlie friends out at a launch party for Sotheby’s new magazine, to be followed by a swimwear fashion show (this all sounds very swoozy, doesn’t it?), to be followed by a trip downtown to see our favorite band, New Congress: an amazing R&B, hip hop, rumpshake,  scritch scratch, freaky deaky, screaming guitar, head banging, hoochie coochie, sweaty, fun, thumpin’ band.  Doctor Dash was dropping me off at the Calhoun Beach Club (where the cougars go to hunt) on his way to Punch Pizza with the kids.  Because he knows this isn’t the tamest bunch of betties and that we tend to get a tad rowdy when we go out and because he’s just a super cautious guy when it comes to his sweet Mama, the following conversation ensues:

Dash:   Have fun but be careful . . . be smart.

Me (with ridiculously enormous sunglasses and grin):  of course, Baby, you know me.  I’m always careful.  And smart!

Supergirl (from the back of the minivan):  Except for that one night you didn’t come home.

OK, first of all, that never happened.  Dash and I look at each other, completely agog.  Total Shaggy and Scooby “zoinks” moment.  That never happened . . . did it?  No, absolutely not.  Holy shit!  Is she fucking with me?  I turn around so I can see her face and she is sitting in her booster seat, swinging her legs, her tan little face lit with mirth.  She starts to giggle her head off and right then and there I realize that she IS fucking with me – that her sense of humor has evolved way beyond potty and knock-knock jokes.  She has gone dark and devious. Genius.  How can she possibly understand the implications of what she is saying?  I’m not sure that she fully does, but she understands enough to know that throwing that out there will stop us dead in our tracks.  And it did.  After I retrieve the eyeballs that have popped out of my head and otherwise gather my wits about me, the conversation continues:

Me:  Supergirl!  Don’t ever say that in front of anyone else!!!  Oh my goodness!  You know that never ever ever happened, right?!??

Supergirl:  Yes it did.

Me:  No it did not!  Do not repeat that in front of anyone!  People will think mommy is . . .  is . . . is . . . a little crazy!

Supergirl:  You are a little crazy.

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