In one week ...

an end table, a dining room chair, and a shattered sliding glass door. And all this destruction was democratic. Each son had a part in at least one of these. And the list is practically endless if you want to include the last year or so.

And of course these are all "accidents." (I say if you throwing a rock-particularly in the direction of the sliding glass door-and the rock hits it, its no accident-especially if you took out a car window in the same way a few months before.)

I don't understand. I don't remember being a destructive kid, but all my sons seem bent on breaking things. I do remember breaking a couple of my sisters' toys-but these were no accidents. One of my brothers kept breaking the garage door windows with his slap shots (I believe a tennis ball was subbing for the hockey puck.)

I also remember carving the words "Good" and "Bad" into the wall (an introspective contemplative struggle of conscience I'm sure). I carved some other stuff into my brother's head board, but signed it, "Jim did this". Some 3-5 years after my carving days were over, my father found these and some others (not from my hand) and blamed me for them all. I couldn't believe it-I thought sure the statute of limitations had run out.

I think I also may have gone through a short spell of dropping dishes. And I am sure our "Texas" football drill where my brother's bed was the touchdown, did nothing for the springs.

Maybe I wasn't so innocent after all. But I never broke furniture, just disfigured it.

How do make an 11-year old pay for a new sliding glass door? To make matters worse, I could see Mrs. Curley wasn't as angry as expected. Could this be because she has wanted to replace that door since day one. (Certainly I don't suspect a conspiracy because Mrs. Curley would fear I would simply put up a piece of plywood and leave it for 6 months or longer-depending on other priorities.)

Having the reputation of being able to fix anything around the house may not be such a good thing after all.

Oremus pro invicem!