March 18, 2008

Lies I've told my 3 year old recently

Trees talk to each other at night.

All fish are named either Lorna or Jack.

Before your eyeballs fall out from watching too much TV, they get very loose.

Tiny bears live in drain pipes.

If you are very very quiet you can hear the clouds rub against the sky.

The moon and the sun had a fight a long time ago.

Everyone knows at least one secret language.

When nobody is looking, I can fly.

We are all held together by invisible threads.

Books get lonely too.

Sadness can be eaten.

I will always be there.

posted at 11:47 PM by raul

Filed under: fatherhood

TAGS: fatherhood (8) kids (19) lies (2)

Comments:

03/19/08 01:25 AM

Fabulously whimsical, haunting stuff, Raul. I miss your photoblog but the text is good, too. Peace.

03/19/08 08:13 AM

I think most people would be willing to believe all of those.

03/19/08 11:57 AM

Great! Don't recall saying any of those, but have done my share of, um, er, lying.

One of the first realizations I had being a parent when our oldest hit the toddler years: Parents lie! (But, it's for the kids' own good?)

-- Mike

03/19/08 01:03 PM

Perhaps there should more of that kind of lying in the world. Peace.

03/19/08 03:38 PM

I think one of the best lies I've ever heard told to a child was the one in the book "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close" about New York's Sixth Borough. I believed it.

Also the fact that we are all held together by invisible threads is not a lie. ;-)

03/19/08 09:21 PM

Your lies have reminded me to tell better lies to my kids. It was a beautiful day here in Western Nebraska and when my daughter was being very loud I took one of your lies and told her to be quiet because I thought I heard a cloud. I said 'SHHHH! DO YOU HEAR IT'. She stopped and looked up as if she was noticing clouds for the first time and whispered "shhhhhhhhh".We sat outside listening to the quiet for longer than I thought a girl her age could sit still. Amazing the amount of magic the right lie can hold.

03/20/08 04:14 AM

I have no kids but I think I'll steal some of your lies and use them on my twin nephews. They are turning 3 in Jun. Amy is absolutely right, the world can certainly use more of this kind of lies. Thanks for sharing.

03/20/08 04:49 PM

I too have told some of these lies to our four-year-old, and the only one I hesitated before uttering is the last on your list. (Adding "to the best of my ability and belief" seemed inappropriate. :)

03/22/08 03:12 AM

The last two killed me.

But hey:

"I sometimes have a queer feeling with regard to you--especially when you are near me, as now: it is as if I had a string somewhere under my left ribs, tightly and inextricably knotted to a similar string situated in the corresponding quarter of your little frame. And if that boisterous channel, and two hundred miles or so of land come broad between us, I am afraid that cord of communion will be snapt; and then I've a nervous notion I should take to bleeding inwardly."

- Mr Rochester to Ms Eyre

03/22/08 12:34 PM

As incredibly whimsical as they are beautiful these lies you tell. Wish all lies were so. Loved this post.

03/23/08 01:09 PM

'Sadness can be eaten.'

Now THAT I can identify with. *grin

03/25/08 09:19 PM

I still believe every single one of these.

04/01/08 02:38 PM

those are beautiful lies ... you definitely won't burn in hell for telling them.

04/03/08 12:08 AM

Unfinished food in the plates will cry if we won't make an effort to eat them all up because they want to join their friends in our tummy too.

04/09/08 01:19 AM

LOVED this.

04/09/08 03:15 AM

I don't like this one: "Before your eyeballs fall out from watching too much TV, they get very loose." Don't tell lies to children to instruct them, please.

04/09/08 05:24 AM

You say that you've told your 3-year-old these lies recently?

I don't believe you.

04/09/08 09:29 AM

Are you really the kids father? or did you lie there too?

04/09/08 10:07 AM

"When every child is asleep, grown-ups go ride rollercoasters all night."

04/09/08 10:28 AM

While some believe all lies are evil, this surely proves that all lies are not evil.

Lies that twinkle like these deserve to be believed.

04/09/08 10:41 AM

how wonderful. i want children too. ;)

04/09/08 10:42 AM

how wonderful. i want children too. ;) just so i can make up fun stories.

they are very beautiful lies.

04/09/08 10:56 AM

Hi, very beautiful and moving piece. I just thought that a few of the things might not really be lies at all:

"Trees talk to each other at night."

Trees and plant communicate with each other and us all the time, although our experience of time is so different that you would have to spend many years living in a tree to start to become attuned to their wavelength. Ask most any small child whether trees talk to each other and they will look at you like you're stupid because it's so obvious to them. The problem is adult humans tend to think that speech and body language are the only means to communicate. Which brings me to...

"Everyone knows at least one secret language."

We do actually. It is the language of the spirit which transcends the spoken word. This has nothing to do with religion which most children could do without. My father is a pastor so I consider myself an authority on the matter.

"We are all held together by invisible threads."

This is about as accurate a description as any regarding how the universe is constructed. What looks like solid matter to you or I is simply threads of energy which are slowed down to match our range of perception. We too are made of these threads and by them we are connected to and a part of everything.

"Sadness can be eaten."

I believe that when someone cooks a meal a part of the person's mental/spiritual state gets transferred to the food being cooked. That is why I try to avoid restaurants where the cooks are unhappy or the environment is not a positive one. Food is way more than just protein, starch and nutrients. Food must nourish the soul as well as the body and mind.

"I will always be there."

Whether here or there, in life or in memory, you will be there for them always.

04/09/08 11:29 AM

Wait ... but ... we ARE all held together by invisible threads.

Aren't we?

04/09/08 11:36 AM

beautiful and hilarious, then you nail us with the last line.
Awesome post.

My mother used to tell me and my brother that a monstrous troll lived under a nearby bridge and that we had to be very quiet when we were driving over it so we didn't wake him up.

I told my sister when she was little that if she kept picking her nose her eyes would fall out. So she clapped one hand over her eyes while she picked her nose with the other. lol

04/09/08 11:37 AM

Beautiful words -- I wish some of these things where true...

04/09/08 12:29 PM

wait a minute, you mean sadness CANNOT be eaten? who authorities these posts??

04/09/08 12:33 PM

Perfect. Good to know I'm not the only one who uses the fantastic, the sublime and the ridiculous as tools for a more enjoyable childhood and parenthood.

04/09/08 12:40 PM

Touchingly sweet.

04/09/08 12:51 PM

I've told my kids that I was an alien, just waiting for the mothership to find me and take me home. [They believed it for the longest time.]

04/09/08 02:17 PM

"If you mix the adult toothpaste with the kid's toothpaste, they explode."

04/09/08 02:21 PM

the ocean is a puddle singing a lullabye.

my neice, now 15, still calls me "pickled potato" because of this neal hamburger comedy skit i used to babble at her when i was trying to get her to calm down or go to sleep. she loved it.

now i'm either "carbuncle jay" or "uncle pickled potato"...weird. but i'll take it because i managed to touch them in their memory and imagination with a little humor. and they'll carry that on to their kids someday.

04/09/08 02:33 PM

love it, last one almost made me cry because I say that too.

how about following it up with 'truths I've told my 3 year old recently"

You can love someone without liking them

Adults are not always right

People will yell at you to try and make you do things

04/09/08 02:37 PM

Trees actually do talk to each other and not just at night...

http://news.softpedia.com/news/Do-Trees-Talk-45806.shtml

04/09/08 02:51 PM

You've been translated into German: http://thinkabout.ch/article/wunderschoene-luegen

04/09/08 04:03 PM

You know those words would make a lovely illustrated childrens book.

[Found this post via Swissmiss]

04/09/08 04:17 PM

"The moon and the sun had a fight a long time ago."

Hmmm...

My three year-old pointed out to me that a song about the Sun and the Moon never appearing together was wrong. He already knows what I know: for about a week every month the Sun and the Moon are in the sky together.

04/09/08 04:30 PM

I like how people think that it's a fun game to lie to children. Very selfish

04/09/08 05:14 PM

so amazingly beautiful and breathtaking. A friend linked me here today and I've shot it out to dozens of others. You're truly gifted and thank you for writing this.

04/09/08 05:14 PM

04/09/08 06:06 PM

There's a huge thread over at metafilter on your post.

http://www.metafilter.com/70670/Lies-Ive-told-my-three-year-old-recently

I'd be interested to hear what you have to say...

04/09/08 06:32 PM

Not much to say really, it's amusing how the comments reveal so much about the commenters.

I posted a little thing in the thread though.

04/09/08 08:48 PM

If you don't want to call them lies just call them one-sentence stories. :-) Nice and whimsical.

As a parent though, I was bothered a bit by the one where you claim to be able to fly when nobody is looking. The one time *you* aren't looking, I sincerely hope your 3 year old doesn't try to fly!

04/09/08 08:59 PM

Purposefully lying to kids reveals the liar's cynicism and disappointment about adulthood. That's ultimately the message the kids receive.

04/09/08 09:19 PM

I've seen this page posted in a number of places and it seem to stir up deep feeling wherever it goes. It's got me thinking about the kinds of likes we tell our kids. There are the lies we tell them to get them to do something or to not do something, there are the lies we tell them to protect them, and there are the lies we tell them to inspire them. I'm a divorced parent. If we had not lied to our 4 year old and 5 year old about the reasons for our divorce we would have devastated our kids. They might still be devastated one day when we tell them the full truth, but by then I hope it will be a little easier to understand.

04/09/08 11:06 PM

im a very depressed person. Reading this so called lies makes me feel really good and childlike. I don't think they are lies at all.
There is a pureness, and truth to all these so called lies.
thank-you

04/10/08 12:33 AM

This reminds me of something else you wrote a long time ago: Undefined. Love the comments this one is spawning.

04/10/08 01:03 AM

What we often think of as the "aw, isn't that cute" innocence of children is basically a programmed-in receptiveness to *anything* that the adults around us tell us.

Right now, as you read this, children all over the world are being told some very hateful, hurtful, untrue, fear-inducing lies by their parents and others in their lives.

Then again, the lie-telling to which we're exposed doesn't stop with adulthood.

04/10/08 01:22 AM

what?
none of these are true?
way to crush my innocence..

04/10/08 01:32 AM

If you undo your belly button, your bottom will fall off.

04/10/08 01:43 AM

What I should have added .... what I was getting to ... is that there are two types of lies we (I'm a parent, too) tell our kids: lie to make them less afraid and generally feel better about themselves and the world (i.e., lies to protect them), and lies to shape them to our point of view, regardless of whether it's good or bad for them.

In short, everything we say to our kids should be to make them smarter, stronger, and more confident, not hateful or afraid.

04/10/08 02:09 AM

I'm new to your blog but in reading your posts about parenting I can tell you and your wife run your lives much as my wife and I do ours. I love the poetry in this post and some of the others and think we share a similar sense of the magic of the world. I like the comment about it being a Latin thing. So true in our family. My kids are a little older now and I feel like our nightly story time in which we all get to exercise our imaginations is an almost sacred thing that keeps us all connected with, as you say, invisible threads. Strong invisible threads.

04/10/08 08:34 AM

great post-very poignant and funny.

love the site design also-very beautiful.


04/10/08 09:16 AM

My girlfriend told her niece that the moon didn't come out at night because she (the niece) had been naughty.
Note to self: only use this one if there's a full moon in the next couple of days. The poor girl felt more and more guilty with each moonless night that followed.

04/10/08 11:03 AM

I thought this was very beautiful, and the critical commentors need to lighten up! Children are far more perceptive than adults and encouraging imagination is NOT a bad thing. They will make their own minds up once they grow and explore the world around them.

why the need to psycho ananlyse? I think this says more about you the poster than the writer.

04/10/08 01:01 PM

What wonderful words and thoughts-- truth is always second in my mind to beauty, to exploration; your "lies" reveal the world to be such an enchanting and wonderful place. These are great thoughts for children to carry with them; while they'll eventually know you were "lying", they'll thank you for the magic of your mind.

We could all learn a lot from seeing the world this way. Thanks so much for sharing it!

04/10/08 02:16 PM

Children fantasize about being adults, but they still know they are children.
Adults fantasize about being children, but think this means they are "child-like".

The child's fantasy expresses hope; the adult fantasy expresses disappointment and pain. They couldn't be more different, even though the content seems to be the same.

So I propose a more radically fantasmic idea: this adult world -- with all its pain, disappointment and disenchantment -- is the very world you dreamt about as a child.

04/10/08 02:31 PM

Nice formulation but I don't think it works for 3 year olds at least not for mine. He doesn't seem to have any particular dreams about the adult world and often dismisses the adult realm by saying "this is not for kids like me". He doesn't yet have any aspirations of being an adult or of living in our world (although he wouldn't mind being a little bit taller). Of course he assumes I'll grow taller too and that we'll always be in sync. I asked him recently if he thought we would be giants one day. "Maybe he said, in a long long time." He dismisses me when I tell him I only grow older not taller by chuckling and saying, "I don't think so dada, that's not how it goes."

04/10/08 03:42 PM

Raul,

"This is not for kids like me" -- is this statement not the viewpoint of the adult world? In a quite paradoxical way, knowing when you are not an adult is somehow the essence of adulthood.

Perhaps that is the truth -- it's not that children are imaginative and "child-like" (unlike adults), in fact, they aren't "child-like" enough! Which is to say that they aspire to grow and understand and become adults, while we as parents wish for them to remain ignorant as long as possible, in part for their sake, but also so that we can, through them, briefly escape from our own terrible truths.

So I think its good to be mindful of the true beneficiary of those lies.

04/10/08 04:29 PM

I too would disagree with Mike. One obviously get into the philosophical pretty quickly by saying "knowing when you are not an adult is somehow the essence of adulthood," but I don't think you are giving kids enough credit. Is awareness of childhood the corrupting knowlege, the figurative apple? I don't think so.

There are so many other stages a child goes through: there is extreme infancy in which a child is vaguely aware of the world period, there is early infancy where the child feels little separation from it's mother, toddlerdom which is a state in which kids have yet to categorize things like adulthood, and childhood which often begins with naming things and understanding the difference between adults and children.Awareness of adulthood is a step on the road to adulthood but there are so many other steps along the way. We often push our children to be little adults and act like little adults but they can not be adults until they have gone through many more transformations. Even children in the worst circumstances, Liberian child soldiers for example, for all they have seen and done, still process the world through a child's eyes which is exactly what makes them so terrifying.

I would also disagree with mike's statement that "Adults fantasize about being children and that the adult fantasy expresses pain and dissapointment. If one is able to enter the portal of childhood imagination through stories or so called lies, instead of being an expression of pain, or of regressive fantasy, I see this as an expression of being connected both to oneself and to ones children, an expression of wisdom. Wisdom of course is the elusive reward of adulthood, the result of a life well lived in all it's agony and it's glory.

04/10/08 04:51 PM

surfed in from crooked house. I thought this post which is also at crooked house was relevant to the last few comments: http://crookedhouse.typepad.com/crookedhouse/2008/04/i-am-not-a-shor.html

04/10/08 06:06 PM

I really enjoyed and related to the lines on this page. None of the "lies" here are meant to be said in a mean or hurtful way, most of them are playful. To mike i say that I feel bad for you, honestly, because you seem to have lost that sense of simplicity, innocence, and imagination that these "lies" nurish. For 2 and 3 year old children, these can be fun, and some even will invoke a sense of wonder and curiousity that can and will stay with them for years, hopefullly there lifetime. And it is that sense of wonder that a child is really after when you say they want to be adults, they are fascinated by them and what they believe they can do (anything). They don't want the pain and truth of it. Why tell them that, and rob them of their most imaginative and innocent years? Anyways, just some food for thought, everyone, I wish you all the best.

04/10/08 08:07 PM

The man in the ice cream van plays music when he's sold everything :-)

04/10/08 10:27 PM

Appleflakes, I think you are right -- some parents force their children to be adults -- but this is readily apparent, and you are only telling half the story. It is equally true that some parents refuse to allow their children to grow up, for selfish reasons. Fantasy can be good, or it can be bad; but let's not over-romanticize it.

Jord, I appreciate your concern for my emotional state :) You seem to be falling into the trap, as many do, that the "truth" of life is that it is pain. If I believed that, then I would agree that we need to protect our children and ourselves from this "truth". But I don't. Instead, I believe that life contains both our darkest, most painful hours and the heights of ecstatic bliss, and that we are strong, resilient creatures who can withstand these extremes.

04/11/08 12:31 AM

Awesome, I loved the one about the clouds rubbing. I'll use that the next time my seven year old and I are playing an exciting game of "Frozen Man"

04/11/08 02:23 AM

These are not lies.
These are things I'd would like to tell to my children (I'm only 18) and these are the kind of things I was told. They're not lies. These make children what they are, pure and happy. Children are the most purely happy people, and I think with this kind of things we make them happy.
I would still like to believe that trees talk to each other at night, and that you can listen to clouds rub against the sky, and I will certainly tell my children that books get lonely because I will want them to love books just like I did when I was young, and I still do.

And you know, sadness can be eaten.
I will tell them that too. Because I believe happiness depends on nothing but ourselves. And I will want my children to be happy.

And don't worry, fathers and mothers, as a soon-leaving-for-college daughter, I can assure you, you will always be there. Always, always, in many ways you don't see.

Just make sure to keep telling this lies, because in the future, we will remember them in a gray day far from home and we will smile and remember the warmth you and home always brought.

A latin daughter has spoken.

Infinite x's & o's...
M.B. Whimsical.

04/11/08 03:11 AM

by my estimation nearly half of those are true ;-)

eventually every perspective reaches true

04/11/08 03:23 AM

Amen to that Whimsical.

I'm amazed at the people who don't get writing like this, or think it is somehow harmful, or are even angered by it.

These were the kinds of 'lies' along with fantastical picture books, nursery rhymes, fairy tales and myths that made my childhood so wonderful. I grew up with a difficult parents who didn't love each other and yet they loved me enough to give me these things in their own unique ways. The magic of that time is what got me through my darkest days and in part still does. This man mike says not to over-romanticize fantasy but we live in a time when the kind of intimate fantasy worlds created by stories shared between adults and children is scarcer than ever. That so many people here and elsewhere have responded to these few sentences with such passion reminds me that we are all as the writer said connected by invisible threads. We are—even if some of us don't know it.

04/11/08 03:41 AM

I wish there were more for grown ups, kids are easy. It's hard to lie about getting your best friends wife preggo. Thanks for the link SUB D.

04/11/08 09:48 AM

Is this the little in fellow in question? What a charmer.

04/11/08 09:54 AM

Almost forgot!

My favorite 'lie' from childhood- My grandad and I used to have long talks about the moon men. He's gone now, but every time I look at the moon I think about the fantastic worlds we used to create up there and feel a little less alone in the world.

04/11/08 12:47 PM

Very cute. I always tried not to lie to my little sister, who was born when I was 14. But make believe is fun and sometimes educating.

04/11/08 01:20 PM

Pay no heed to the dreary dullards who would extinguish the flame of imagination and vitality held in these tiny tales. If you are lucky, you and your child will share your secret language far past his childhood, and if you are really lucky you will be able to share these things with his children when you are as old as me.

Ad astra per alia porci!

04/11/08 01:38 PM

These are just so beautiful. And as others pointed out, very true. Thank you.

"He dismisses me when I tell him I only grow older not taller by chuckling and saying, 'I don't think so dada, that's not how it goes.'"

My three year old's theory is that while she grows taller and older, I am growing younger. (Oh, how I wish). So she firmly believes that someday she will be the mama and I the baby, and that she will take care of me.

And in truth, that is not far-fetched. I may only shrink an inch or two when I am old, but sometimes children do end up mothering their mothers in old age. I've never corrected her.

04/11/08 04:04 PM

Those are exactly the same lies I tell my employer when I'm out sick....

04/11/08 04:49 PM

If you've been enjoything this thread you'll like this post by Tilda Swinton: http://www.vertigomagazine.co.uk/showarticle.php?sel=bac&siz=0&id=590

04/12/08 10:27 PM

Brilliant. Reminds me of Jack Handey from Saturday Night Live.

04/13/08 12:43 AM

Very cool!

04/14/08 02:01 PM

They wouldn't be lies if no one believed them, right?

04/15/08 07:07 AM

This is a beautiful post. But they are lies - everyone knows that aliens live in drain pipes, not tiny bears.

Anyone who claims to have never lied to a child is simply fooling themselves. I have a 6 year old and while I sometimes feel the need to be painfully honest (about things such as why my dad's dog isn't there anymore), I also have an amazing time telling 'lies' (otherwise known as fairy stories) and I know that if he grows up to keep half the imagination he has now I will have done a good job.

DavidFM - what a brilliant lie that is!

04/15/08 07:09 PM

Thank you. I took the liberty of translating this into Hebrew, and repost it (credits and links included) on my blog.

Wonderful!

http://www.hapinkas.co.il/?p=453

04/16/08 12:39 PM

just when I start to get old and cranky, I read something like the foregoing and well....and well, I think I will leave that thought unfinished. I can only say that it reminds me of a time I was sitting on a plane next to a young girl and her Mother...as the plane took off and climbed through the clouds, the young girls eyes got very big and she turned and asked..."mommy are we in heaven yet"? "Yes" the Mother replied, "and these clouds are the safest part of heaven"....

Okay Im not sure thats what the girls' Mother really said, but after reading the "lies" above thats what I prefer to remember...."the safest part of heaven"

Brilliant Raul, brilliant....I wish I was an illustrator so I could draw pictures to go with the respective thoughts...

by the way, now that I know that all fish are named either Lorna and Jack, I smile more.

04/18/08 12:39 AM

But we are held together by invisible threads. we just call by other names ;D You'll find those names in your biology and physics books when you get older. :D

04/18/08 01:12 PM

I'm a pre-school teacher and I think Ms. Rocca's post and site speaks volumes about her general attitude on life.

Parents help shape a child's realities. Playful encouragement of fantasy and development of a an child's imagination is one of the best things parents can do to help them form as whole and healthy people. We occasionally have children with parents like Ms. Rocca who emphasize absolute truth and I find they are often able to enjoy fairy tales and other children's books. They will look at them and constantly ask, "Is this real? Did that really happen?" If you tell them that the story is not real they try to break the spell for other kids. I remember one little boy pulling a Harold book away from another saying, "Harold's crayon doesn't do anything. It doesn't make anything. It's just a crayon." I loved the other boy's response, "His crayon does make things, look he made the moon, and a rocket... and even the whole world." The first boy fought back, "But it's not real!" And the boy with book finally said, "It's real to me." Then he turned his back and continued reading.

The Santa thing is another conversation. I find the discovery of the Santa myth to be a fascinating and often empowering secret for children. For many it's as if they've peeled off one layer of reality to reveal another. Apples and oranges as far as I'm concerned and has nothing to do with this wonderful little poem and all the thought it has inspired.

Finally for Ms. Rocca, just because someone disagrees vehemently doesn't mean they are being condescending. This poem has obviously inspired many people to reminisce about some of the things they find so delicious about childhood (and a few like yourself who have been reminded of hurtful things). The responses to your post are certainly no more or less heartfelt and pointed than your own posts.

04/18/08 02:28 PM

told to a me by a friend years ago...

'lied' to her by her parents when she was 5...

"when the icecream truck plays music that means it has run out of icecream for the day"


but i think the last one on the original post is one that stays with me... my father still tells me this one even now that i'm in my 30's. i hope its not a lie.

04/20/08 02:46 AM

delightful!

yet, the end leaves me feeling sobered.

04/21/08 10:09 AM

Ecch.

04/21/08 11:41 PM

well being a mom of one very strong willed four year old boy, I guess saying you better brush your teeth or they will fall out of your head was not exactly the most appropriate response for I dont' want to brush my teeth was all I heard. I want my teeth to fall out. Some of these lies are tame and some could be taken quite literally by such a little impressionable mind.

04/22/08 02:58 AM

I told my daughter the "lie" about the clouds on Sunday while spread out on a picnic blanket. We were there just the two of us quiet and listening and when the wind picked up she squeezed my hand and whispered, "I think I hear it!" Then she confided that she thought she could hear the stars sometimes too. I asked what they sounded like and she said "little bells". In that moment I wished I could hear them too. Thanks for giving me that small moment of grace.

I keep coming back here to read comments. Such a nice thread with the exception of Miss Rocca who is fast becoming trollish (We get it, you believe belief in the fantastic is damaging as well as suspension of disbelief apparently. You are a tiny minority both in this forum and the world. I think when you start equate children who enjoy fairy tales (and suspend their disbelief while reading them because they want the fairy tales to be real) to suicide bombers, you are the one with the problem. Also Ms. is a polite way to address someone when you don't know their marital status. So both Misses and Mesdames are properly addresses as Ms. Now please go torment other people.)

04/22/08 09:53 PM

You are breaking my heart.

04/26/08 12:11 PM

but these are true:

Trees talk to each other at night.

We are all held together by invisible threads.

Sadness can be eaten.

I will always be there.


and this is too beautiful:

If you are very very quiet you can hear the clouds rub against the sky.

04/26/08 05:19 PM

Just popped over from Five Star Friday and wanted to say how beautiful these lies (though I would call them stories) are. Especially If you are very very quiet you can hear the clouds rub against the sky and sadness can be eaten.

I remember my dad telling me that security cameras had mice in them, there to watch over people and make sure they were OK. This kind of lie makes for lovely memories.

05/08/08 01:26 PM

Just beautiful..
poetry.
xoAndrea

05/16/08 09:29 PM

I don't understand why you chose to call them lies. Could you elaborate on why you call them lies and not stories?

05/18/08 04:16 PM

Some of these make me feel warm and fuzzy - I'd sure love to believe:
Everyone knows at least one secret language.
When nobody is looking, I can fly.

What I do know is true:
We are all held together by invisible threads.

Thank you for this post.

Tamara

05/28/08 08:19 AM

That's true though...most of my life has been spent being very quiet so I can hear the clouds rub against the sky. :)

06/06/08 08:21 PM

All fish are named either Lorna or Jack.

So how did you explain Nemo?

06/10/08 12:37 PM

I love the Sun and Moon one. I will be using that one, however my son is only 3 months old so it may be awhile yet.

08/07/08 01:04 AM

WOW!! Beautiful lies...Love to hear more like this...

http://www.yummyuck.com

08/19/08 11:45 AM

Hi.

I thought those lies were well sweet! They're cute, magical and funny. Though the last one was kinda sad.

I was wondering if i could use some of them in a book i am writing? x

09/01/08 09:57 PM

I really enjoyed the lies. There was nothing harmful in them.
And, yes, I have lied to my three year old!

I tell her to look at the lizard on the ceiling in order to rinse the shampoo out of her hair. This is the only way I can rinse her hair without a complaint.

Even today, I lied to her. I fixed spaghetti, and she kept call the sauce Barbecue sauce. I corrected her four times. After that, I said, okay, it's barbecue sauce.

She really hates thunderstorms, so, I might just have to tell her that the clouds are arguing with each other. She's not old enough to comprehend the science behind thunder, like her seven year old brother.

09/13/08 04:30 PM

I just found this and I wanted to say that I loved it. I am going to share some of them with my 3 year old daughter.

I get her to nap some days by getting her to watch the leaves "dancing". They are having a grand party and waltzing right up in the trees.

I also use the old "God is bowling" when it storms.

10/24/08 01:48 PM

Fun! I'll have to remember these for my 2 year old.

01/03/09 08:04 AM

my 3 yr old daughter is contantly asking why? then when i answer she will add why on to the answer and so I go on, yesterday we both discoverd a little man works at the car park lifting the barriers up. he sits inside the base.

03/03/09 08:02 PM

this is really nice, bittersweet stuff.

03/14/09 02:25 AM

Oh man, I can't wait till my little girl can understand the things I say. Then I'm really in trouble. Good stuff!

03/15/09 08:50 PM

These are great lies. I like them a lot.

They are the sweet conversation that tells kids you love them without saying "I love you." Sometimes easier to digest for a young palate.

:-)

08/24/09 03:38 PM

I have eaten my sadness today for lunch and found it much more nourishing and preferable to leaving it out to rot.

08/26/09 06:11 PM

Julio Cortázar wrote a short story about the bears that live in the pipes. If I remember right, he said that sometimes when you're washing they'll pop out and lick your face.

I think it was in his book Historias de Cronopios Y De Famas (Stories of Cronopios and Famas). They're very short, and I'm sure kids would love some of them.

11/24/09 01:23 AM

beautiful lies, except i found eight of them to be true.

the trees still do talk about that celestial fight from years ago.

04/08/10 01:01 PM

I wonder what sadness tastes like? I'm sure a vegetarian or something can comment...

04/30/10 01:20 PM

The moon and the sun had a fight a long time ago... Who won?

10/13/10 06:33 PM

It really sucks how parents just lie to there kids like this.I'm 12,and things like this really tick me off,this is why I find it hard to believe my parents in any thing they say to me.

11/15/10 02:25 PM

To the people who think "lying" to your children is horrible. I have to ask do you intend to put Christmas gifts under the tree with "from Santa" written on them? What about hiding chocolates around the house from the Easter Bunny? Or for that matter, replacing a lost tooth with a dollar from the tooth fairy? To those of you who said yes...These are lies too.

03/04/11 04:20 AM

I wonder what sadness would taste like

07/26/13 03:53 PM

I explained to my daughter that in the spring when the cherry blossoms bloom the fairies come for a holiday and sleep in the flowers. They go back to Fairyland when the blossoms die. I found her ringing a bell and looking out the window at the tree and she said she was waking up the fairies.

07/26/13 06:23 PM

I think that one about threads is true...

07/28/13 02:57 PM

And then you will complain when your teenagers think you are rubbish and dismiss everything you say! Fantasy is one thing and does not pretend to be the truth but lies are lies are lies and ultimately cripple us even when meant in the kindest of ways.

07/29/13 05:44 AM

My three year old actually told me about the bears living in the pipes.
As he is afraid of bears I thought it best to agree with him that it was true, that way I am certain he will never try to crawl into one.

07/29/13 05:44 AM

My three year old actually told me about the bears living in the pipes.
As he is afraid of bears I thought it best to agree with him that it was true, that way I am certain he will never try to crawl into one.

07/31/13 10:58 AM

One night my just turned two year old and I were walking, and ahead of us the moon had just risen above the trees. He said "Look Daddy! the moon!" I said "it's really pretty". He took off at a slowish easy trot and said calmly "I'll get it". So yes, these kids are ready and receptive to the fantastic.

When he was a bit older a stick that he picked up and was using like Harry Potter suddenly became the tv remote.
And when they are the right age you can magically pull anything up to about a loaf of bread size out of their ears. My kids are 13 and 11, and they still sometimes ask me if I was doing real magic. They know I wasn't, but they believe I was.

12/05/15 06:39 PM

Has your son run away yet?

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