My Little Litter Bug

From my son,

I want explanations

that I,

at his age,

could never

have given.

As my children get older, I think a lot about what kind of a kid (and young adult) I was.

I wasn’t a bad kid.

I stayed out of trouble.

That said, the only real reason that I stayed out of trouble was because I was lucky and didn’t get caught doing the bad things that I did.

Had I been asked for a reason as to why I stole a shirt or beer or a friend’s money, I wouldn’t have been able to give one.

Had I been asked what I was thinking when I decided to roll pumpkins down a hill into a busy street, or huff gasoline, or throw a packet of fireworks into the school gym while most of the students in my grade were taking a final exam, I would only have been able to say that I wasn’t thinking. Or rather, perhaps, that I was focused on the adrenaline rush and the pre-thrill of the actions and nothing else.

I’ll say it again, though, and mean it, I wasn’t a bad kid, and I didn’t have a bad upbringing. I just, for some reason, did a lot of stupid shit with my friends.

Had I been caught doing these things, maybe I wouldn’t have continued doing them for as long as I did. Maybe I would have grown up a little faster.

I don’t know.

My reason for having walked over 10,000 steps today is that I was teaching my children a lesson. After finding out a month ago that they had been using their allowance money to buy candy for their friends, eating it on the school playground after school had finished, and stuffing the garbage into the sewers, I had a long talk with them about respecting school rules and the effects of littering.

I had thought that a long talk would be enough.

Turns out it wasn’t. Yesterday, I got a call from the school and my daughter was at it again.

So today, instead of being allowed to play with her friends, my daughter had to accompany me on a walk across the city, picking up trash and filling plastic bags along the way, to a store where I’m hoping to sell some stenciled hand bags (as seen in this post).

I expect to have another 10,000 step day tomorrow, as the littering lesson continues.
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Walking