No two words conjure up humiliating experiences for parents like the words “in public.”
Sometimes children don’t intentionally embarrass their parents in front of total strangers. Kids are just so honest that they state the obvious truth, whether it’s polite or not. Like when a 3-year-old boy I know pointed to an overweight man in the grocery store and declared, “That man is fat, Mommy!” The mortified mom apologized profusely, while the red-faced man put chicken breast in his shopping cart and said, “I know kid, but I’m trying.”

Then there are times when you wish you hadn’t told your spouse in front of “little radar ears” that you’re tired of the neighbor’s dog doing its business in your yard. A friend of mine said her 5-year-old daughter has repeated so many conversations she and her husband have had in the privacy of their own home that they’ve stopped talking to each other. Instead, they use baseball signals to ask each other to pass the salt and pepper at dinner.

My husband and I thought we were safe from public humiliation, since our son is only 2 years old. But we learned the hard way that even at 2, kids repeat everything you don’t want them to.

To give you background, my husband uses inventive phrases to describe the wretched smells when our son expels gas or fills his diaper. For instance, he tweaks the song “Smelly Cat” from the sitcom “Friends” by singing, “Smelly kid, smelly kid, what are they feeding you? Smelly kid, smelly kid, it’s not your fault.”

The real stinker was when my son used one of those phrases to describe my husband, and of course, it happened in public. We were in the grocery store. My husband was keeping our son occupied in the cereal aisle, while I shopped three aisles over.

My husband, who was suffering from a stomach bug, must have felt safe passing gas, since no one else was in the cereal aisle. Next thing I hear is our son saying, “Did you toot, Daddy?” About two seconds later just as the stench was filling the air, some unsuspecting ladies enter the aisle, and our son yells, “Oh Daddy, you laid a rotten egg! We need to change your diaper!”

Ever since, my husband and I have communicated like baseball players, tapping our arms and pulling our earlobes to convey that our son needs a diaper change. We’ve gotten so good at the signals, we’re thinking of trying out for the majors.

‹ Shasta Clark is a St. Clairsville native who lives in Chagrin Falls, Ohio, with her husband and son. Her e-mail address is clarkshasta@hotmail.com.