Storytime

----Stupid Boys----

Several years ago I found myself in the unenviable position of teaching Sunday School to a bunch of four and five year olds. I don't remember why I was asked to do the job. Evidently all of the qualified parishioners were unable at the time or were taking a well-deserved break. However it happened, I wound up in a large room with about a dozen heel-biters and only my intelligence and wisdom to see me through the hour. I nearly died.

Actually, not all of the kids were acting up. The girls were all being very sweet as they braided each others' hair and shared baby dolls and took turns with coloring books. They waited patiently as the boys would steal their toys and pull their hair and tried to pull up their frilly dresses. I followed the boys around the best I could and just repeated the words "stop it" and "put that down" as often as possible. No wonder nobody wanted this job. Stupid boys!

Finally, I had an idea. I somehow managed to corral most of them into a circle and with extreme effort got them to all sit down. I rolled a ball to the first little girl and asked her what she wanted to be when she grew up. "I want to be a princess", said the little cherub as she gently rolled the ball back to me. Wow! I'm a genius! I have their attention. I am engaging their little brains and their hands at the same time and it's working. I rolled the ball to the next little girl and asked her the same question. "I want to be a teacher" she said sweetly. "Oh, that's great, Becky" I gushed. "You'll be a great teacher!"

Then I rolled the ball to the little demon-spawn of a boy sitting next to the future teacher and before I could even ask him the question, he grabbed the ball and jumped up shouting, "I want to be a pee pee man! I want to be a pee pee man!" and then every boy in the circle jumped up screaming about being pee pee men as the girls just rolled their eyes and went back to hair braiding.