Soaking it up.

Our children are sponges. And by "our," I don't mean my husband's and mine. We only have one, after all. I mean OURS, collectively. Any parent who has a child or any person raising a child as theirs. This became evident when a school bus cut me off the other day. Avery was in the backseat, telling me about her day at school. I had just come from picking her up. She's three now, and loves to tell stories. But back the bus. It cuts me off in an obvious way. He was in the straight lane, I was in the left turn lane. As I went to turn left, the bus driver decided he, too, would like to go this direction. So he did. Cutting me off, almost causing an accident. If I'd been alone in the car, I might've let him hit me just to give my rage at the situation an outlet. However, Avery was present, and so I did the rational thing and slammed on my brakes while honking my horn. I wish this was all I had done, but being a road rager, I also shouted out, "Watch out, you douchebag!" Avery, cute as pie in the backseat, shouts "DOUCHEBAG!" and laughs. I felt terrible. I don't cuss in front of her. My husband and I make it a point not to, and feel terrible on the rare occasions when a "Shit!" slips out. But I don't really consider the term "douchebag" a cuss word. Just a fantastic insult. But when I heard the word echoed in the back, out of the mouth of my sweet girl, I was filled with regret. I am responsible for teaching her. Is this what I want to be filling her vocabulary with? I immediately told her that mommy was sorry and that was NOT a nice word and please don't repeat it. Fast forward to last night. Laying in bed, she stroked my face and said to me "Everyone loves you!" This is something I say to her. I tell her every day that she is so loved. And that's she's beautiful. And so she doesn't become vain, I also tell her that in addition to being beautiful, she's also smart and sweet and funny. And everyone loves her. To hear her, unprompted, repeating this to me melted my heart. It's then that I realized she is a sponge. Do I want her to tell people they're douchebags, or do I want her to tell them they're loved? I think you know.