Kathleen McCall:
Occasional�� Muse�

2002-12-19 - 6:18 a.m.

Liar Liar

My kid's been lying to me. Yeah. I think so.

The stained glass piece that was ready to be re-hung is broken. Neither kid went anywhere near it. It must have exploded spontaneously.

The oil lamp bottles were sitting in a pool of oil. Neither kid went anywhere near them. So, of course, one of the bottles must be leaking. But an overnight test proved they weren't.

The pepper grinder is broken. It must have gotten pushed off the table - an accident one might have and not notice, but SOMEONE noticed because they picked it up and set it back on the table, including the broken handle. But neither kid was anywhere near the thing - another case of spontaneous breakage.

I dunno. I think I got a liar here somewhere.

Thing is, I go too easy on her. I know which kid lies and which kid doesn't. One kid has never been able to lie - even such polite untruths as "I had a good time at the party" have troubled her conscience enough that she has to confess them before bed.

The other kid has momentary truths, things that SEEM true, or might BE true if one wished hard enough that one hadn't broken/forgotten/blurted, but they don't seem to jive with OTHER people's versions of reality. And being a kid, when pressed, she will grab that lie with both hands and never never never let it go. It becomes her survival, that lie, and the longer and louder she keeps it the more convinced she gets that she's strong enough to change every one else's reality.

Of course, put her in her room to cool off long enough, she'll admit the difference. But not because she seems to have moral trouble with personal fictions - she just wants out of that room.

She wasn't blessed with the right kind of mother to deal effectively with this issue. Firstly, I think calling someone a liar is a terrible thing - I think a liar is a terrible thing to be. So I'm overly cautious in busting her on things if I didn't actually SEE them; and I'm probably overly conscious of not stacking her up against her sister and causing that kind of tension. So I can't say, "Hey, I think one of you broke my stained glass, and your sister doesn't lie so it must be YOU," even though I am fairly certain this is true. Reasonable doubt- maybe it spontaneously cracked. Maybe I fell out of bed onto it in my sleep. Don't EVER put me on a jury, man, can you spell deadlock?

I'm also very conscious of the gradients between truth and fiction. Between accidental and deliberate. These are fine lines. The lines between the convenient "I don't remember what happened at school today," and "I don't feel like talking about school with you right now." If I am scrupulous in examining my own truths, and in correcting myself when I slip and say how I WANT to be instead of how I am, it's been a hard-won lesson. Honesty is an ongoing rigorous process, not a state one achieves permanently.

And truth is always a stepwise approximation for her. "I didn't break it." "I don't think I broke it." "I don't REMEMBER breaking it." "I don't remember NOT breaking it." "I might have broken it accidentally."

It makes you think I must have meted out horrible punishments, to make this kid so afraid to tell the truth. I never did. What is she afraid of losing? My regard for her? My love? But I find it hardest to love a liar - she knows this. A breaker of stained glass - well, these things happen; and yes, they often happen when one is bouncing on mother's bed when one is not supposed to bounce on mother's bed. But the real punishment for her must be the way I doubt her word - the way I look at her when she says, "I didn't." "It was an accident." I don't believe her.

I don't know if that hurts her. It sure as hell hurts me.

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