Consider

Before I had kids I swore no child of mine would ever go out in public with snot crusties under their nose.

My children would never play video games and only watch educational nature programs on television.

They would always eat a wide array of fresh vegetables with their dinner. My kids wouldn't even know that Cheetos exist.

Our family would shun all commercial super-hero and or cartoon-like characters.

My children would always speak in whisper-soft tones at church. They would only WALK in hallways, and never touch anything with sticky hands.

The only phone calls I'd ever receive from principals and/or teachers would be to praise my child's excellent academic prowess or to commend their compassion and general helpfulness toward other students.

In their spare time they would solve crossword puzzles, practice and master a myriad of difficult instruments and generally excel at sports.

Needless to say, I've faltered on almost all unrealistic counts. I think my kids are doing fine anyway. Actually, despite the huge void left by a lack of Cheetos and Ding-Dongs in their lives, I think they are pretty well-rounded. I guess I just had to walk a mile in a mother's shoes before a snot encrusted reality hit.

Maybe I've been thinking about expectations and understanding this week because of an incident on the school bus. Seth came home last week exclaiming that all the kids on his bus were SO loud that the bus driver had to go to extreme measures. He stopped the bus, told the kids he'd be getting out for two minutes and that they could be as crazy as they wanted. When he got back on, they were all to be completely quiet. Seth bragged that in that two minutes he managed to climb over seats, sit in the driver's seat and pretend to drive and yell as loud as he wanted. He said it was the best bus ride of his life. When the driver got back on, everyone returned to their seats and were quiet as church mice for the rest of the ride.

The next day that bus driver lost his job.

I'm feeling conflicted about this. It was definitely not the way I would have handled the situation myself (but then, I've never been a bus driver). However, I have to feel sorry for somebody who loses a job in this economy, especially somebody who was trying to do what they thought was right.

And I think my former expectations regarding parenthood might reflect how easy it is to judge someone else's job performance.

Thoughts?

And a quote of the day from Modern Family (which I don't typically watch, but happened to catch this tidbit as I flipped by): "I'm a MOM in Hawaii with her FAMILY. It's not a vacation, it's a business trip."

P.S. to the non-believers . . . There comes a point in a child's cold where if you continue to regularly wipe the nose it turns into an act of cruelty.