Potty Talk and Where To Go Potty

I'm not quite sure where it all went wrong. The day started out like every other day. Kids and lunch-boxes were dropped off with bids of see-you-laters and just-one-more-kiss and, for the most part, even though we were 4 kids over the limit and 1 teacher short, it promised to be somewhat smooth sailing. My co-teacher and I talked about our plan of attack for the day over the wails of sirens that only 3 year old boys can perfect, sirens that still make me wonder where the fire is. It was decided that my co would take a small group of four to the Light and Shadow room for some investigations while I stayed in the classroom with the remaining children to work on some bigger projects. About five minutes into our work I changed course and chose to get everyone outside where they had more space in which to kill each other, since they seemed bent on doing so anyway. After about 30 more minutes of “I need help with my coat” and “I have to go pee again” we were finally in the fresh air where I started to do some deep breathing exercises to bring my blood pressure back down. We decided to walk to the garden situated at the back of our school through a gate at the end of our playground. Sixty-five percent of the kids stuck to the plan while the rest thought it would be hilarious to run the other direction. After some more cat-herding negotiations we were finally in the same area at the same time. I took this moment to take another deep breath. We're all here. We're safe. We're alive. Good.

Mounds of snow and ice were scattered throughout the garden and most of the children used this opportunity to either jump in it or eat it. I usually try to discourage the eating of it because God knows whats in it but after I've reach my nagging limit for the day I just say, "Whatever, its your stomach." One little girl, whom I'll call Tina, seems to have an unquenchable oral fixation even though she should clearly be over the I-put-everything-in-my-mouth infant discovery phase.

I turned my back on the snow munchers for a second to remind another 3 foot tall friend that hopping down icy stone steps was a great way to get hurt. I swung back around to see another friend, naked from the waist to his knees, now struggling to get his undies back up. I was truly confused for a second. What on earth could he be doing? My first thought was that maybe he was all bunched up or something was itchy or a bug got in there? Trying to maintain as much calmness as possible I asked, “What's going on Hunter?” He looked up with the biggest smile of accomplishment since Phelps and his Olympic Golds and answered, “I's peein' on the snow.” Slightly stunned from this brazen display and too frazzled by this point to immediately handle the situation with some Dr. Phil psycho-babble I caught yet another development out of the corner of my eye. Apparently Tina had noticed Hunter pointing and saying “snow”. Thinking he was pointing out another icy cold buffet , her tiny pink tongue was now inches from where he had proudly relieved himself. I yelped and reached out just in time to catch her coat and pull her back from certain disaster. She, of course, thought I was just physically enforcing the anti-snow-eating policy and threw herself into a full body display of stubbornness and anger. I hugged her and tried to slowly explain why I'd stopped her but she would hear none of it. Hunter, still struggling to pull up his pants and loudly touting his accomplishment was pulled into the impromptu conference as I explained, while buttoning his britches, that eating snow and peeing on snow were things we should probably NOT do at school.

Just when I thought the day could not possibly be any more exciting a fellow 3 year old from another class, I'll call Mason, threw down an object and enjoying the noise it made yelled out, “That's bullshit!” Fortunately another teacher immediately swooped in with a list of school-approved fun words like “Shaboom” or “Shabang” to say. Unfortunately the damage had already been done and just as I was helping Hunter go pee in the school-approved potty he happily yelled out, “Bullshit! that's a great word, Mason, Bullshit!”