Servant For A Day

Last night at dinner I asked David to do one little chore, take out the garbage. This is one of his normal chores so there should not have been an issue with the request. However, he decided to ask a question "why do parents treat their kids like servants?" This was just another bad decision on his part, after a week of bad decisions.

So this morning he got to see what mom does when her servant is busy playing. He is responsible to clean his room, pick up his clothes and make his bed. I had explained he would also have to mop his floor, which I usually do after he has completed his part.

He did a very quick job of shoving his junk around and mopping only in the spots left over. The dirty clothes were hidden on the other side of the bed. I made him come in and correct these issues.

After much attitude I added vacuuming the study rug, more attitude. I explained that more griping, moaning and complaining would result in more work. Time to add cleaning the bathroom sink, more attitude. Clean the bathtub and finally his attitude began to correct. I took him to the grocery store and had him bring in all the groceries (except the bread).

At lunch he started more attitude, so he got the job of cleaning the toilet (twice since the first time he just played at cleaning it). More attitude and he got to mop the bathroom floor and take out the trash in the study.

Finally no complaining.

If you haven't been reading my blog you might imagine David wasn't very smart. But, that's just the problem—he is very smart. He is also very stubborn and thinks he can outlast us. I am hoping that his day of forced labor will result in his being more aware of what I do all day.

I think he must have thought I used "mommy magic" to get it all done without lifting a finger.