Sarcasm

I've seriously gotta work on the whole sarcasm thing. I'm a sarcastic person by nature. Gasp!? C'est nes vrais! But yes, it's true! Generally, most days, you'll find me oozing with sarcasm during any type of a conversation. I don't know why, I just do.

So yesterday evening at the dinner table, we're talking about the boys' bickering. By "boys" I'm talking about Josh and Drew obviously. Andy was telling me about how within 5 minutes of leaving the pool, he was reminded why his mom never took them on vacation anywhere. One does this, one did that in retaliation, one choose another form of retaliation. One cried. One tattle-tails. One shoves. One hits. One splashes. He was like... Good GRIEF kids?! What the heck!

I just smiled and sipped my tea.

And then Josh pipes in, "...but he started it?"

Again, I smile and raise my eyebrows. I turn to face Josh with a look of "oh ... REALLY?"

Drew tries to butt in to his own defense.

Josh tries to further explain how Drew did this, so he did this which resulted in this...and then that... which led to this causing that. Even I was growing weary listening to excuse after excuse after excuse of how it was all Drew's fault.

So I looked at Josh with a "get real" face and said, "So, you're expecting me to believe that eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeverything is all Drew's fault?"

Josh's resposne, "Pretty much."

So I look at Drew with a face that said, "Everything coming out of my mouth is a big fat lie," and I said to Drew, "Josh is SUUUUUUUCH a perfect son and everything that goes wrong is obviously your fault. Josh never does aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaanything wrong. He's tooooooooooooooootally innocent."

And then Drew put his head on his knees in the chair ... and began to sob. :( Can you just hear my heart breaking? I was trying to be ridiculously sarcastic and Drew thought I was serious saying what a better person Josh was than he was and basically how horrible of a person he was.

Epic.Mommy.Moment.Failure.

I set my dinner down and went to my son and wrapped my arms around him and said, "Drew, everything I was saying was NOT TRUE. It was sarcasm. I know that Josh starts just as much mischief as YOU do. I was basically meaning the complete opposite."

Then Josh pipes in, "Oh...so you're saying I'm a horrible person?"

I was ready to throw bbq sauce all over him and send them to their room. I hate that whole "taking the words out of context thing." I'm like... let me make Drew feel better... shut your freakin' pie hole and KEEP IT SHUT!

Of COURSE you're not a horrible person
but... equally OF COURSE are you NOT COMPLETELY INNOCENT so quit acting like it!

Lesson learned. Sarcasm is definitely a skill that comes with age. Note to self -- no more sarcasm for the six year old for fear MY heart will break if I see him crying again thinking my words were true.