Top 3 Things my kids Learned from this election

Because it's Monday....Top 3 things my kids have learned from this election:

1. That you can’t respect women if you call them names on live television. Parker watched the last debate with me. I did not talk to him during the debate, I wasn’t trying to color his views, and it was too hard to explain issues while trying to listen. But the next morning, I asked if he had any questions. Just one, he said. “Mom, is Donald Trump a liar?” I told him that I thought both candidates probably said some things that weren’t 100% true and it wouldn’t be fair to pretend that one was totally honest and the other was not. Then he said, “But he said likes women…and then he said ‘such a nasty woman.’” Yep, son. There’s that.

2. That you don’t touch people without permission. We’ve had a version of this conversation before, only it was me warning them about pervy pedophiles or creepy older kids. This went a little differently. You don’t really imagine, when you have a baby boy, one day explaining how you don’t touch girls in certain ways without their permission and that if you do, A. that’s totally wrong and B. you could go to jail. Glass half full – if my sons learn nothing else from me, EVER, I hope that lesson sticks.

3. That these things matter enough that I made them get out of bed, get out of the house at the unholy hour of 6:45 am, so that I could get in line on the 2nd day of early voting. And then, when it was my turn, I made them put down their fast food picnic on the floor of the civic center (because yes, I bribed them with breakfast, how else do you think I got them out of the house??) and I made them stand with me while I showed them how and who I was voting for. And that whether you like Hillary Clinton or not, it was a big deal that for the first time ever, a woman was on the ballot.

Of course, my kids being kids, they were all “OMG MOM, this is so boring.” But, I like to think one day they’ll have learned something from this election.
Because glass half empty: that dude could win tomorrow.
But glass half full: even if he does, I can still do everything in my power to ensure my boys turn into better men than that.