I'm Telling Mom!

I was watching a bit of that dog and pony show last week where a bunch of senators with bloated egos were 'grilling' the big shots of Goldman Sachs. It kind of reminded me of a mother bawling out her recalcitrant children that she had spoiled since birth, and then when she was done, telling them that she would give them some ice cream if they behaved. Later as the Goldman Sachs guys were leaving the hearing, trailing a coating of slime on the floor behind them, I thought of my mother. She would have never let them get away with the vague, partial answers that they gave. My mom would have had their smug little asses spilling the beans, and admitting that they'd screwed everyone, including their grandmothers.

My mom was a master at getting the truth out of her children. Having to deal with eleven of us all pointing at each other and blaming everyone but ourselves for transgressions, my mom had worked out a few tricks. Sure, she had the eternal threat of "Wait until your dad gets home!". If that didn't scare the truth out of us, at least it got us out of her hair for a while as we all scattered to our hiding places, where we cowered in fear, dreading the sound of Big Al's station wagon pulling into the driveway. That threat served my mom well over the years, but she had another little trick that used to drive me crazy, mostly because it worked on me every time. Here is how it would go. I would have done some kind of misdeed that was high on the list of things that mom and dad considered evil and hell bound. In the course of conversation with one of my siblings, little, tiny bits of information about the said misdeed, would be dropped. Mother, who had the hearing of a bat, would pick up on these little nuggets of information, and after a while would interject into the conversation as if she knew all about what I was talking about. At that point I'd think to myself, "Gee, I guess it's alright if mom is talking about it." I would then proceed to spill my guts, and fill in the rest of the picture for mom. No matter how many times this happened to me, I was always surprised to see my mom's face turn from friendly confidant to grand inquisitor.  "You did what ? You just wait until your dad gets home mister." Damn, she was good.