In sickness and self-righteousness

My husband and I are about as far apart on the spectrum of believing our kids when they say or think they are sick as you can get. My instinct is always to believe them without question, keep them home from school, tuck them in bed and worry that they're suffering from bubonic plague or the like. His instinct is to declare that they're - maybe not faking, but certainly exaggerating, or just psyching themselves out, because Angus in particular has a very nervous stomach - and send them to school or make them play baseball or hockey and hope for the best. 

The general perversity of things being what they are, both of us turn out to be wrong at least half the time. I still maintain that my way is better, because would you rather feel like a bit of an ass when you keep the kid home and within two hours s/he is running circles around you, pulling down the curtains, demanding video game time and a tenth cookie, or LOOK like a giant ass when your kid barfs in the middle of the classroom/cruise ship dining room/bowling alley/birthday cake? 

Eve's been home from school for most of the week with my stomach bug, and I kept her home one last day yesterday because she was still pale and tired, but she hadn't thrown up for 48 hours so I said she could still go to her friend's house after school because the friend (and her mother) were desperate for her to come over and I was pretty sure she was no longer shedding virus (you're welcome Clara). 

Angus was supposed to go to an Ottawa 67s hockey game for a friend's party last night, and he stayed home from school because he was achy and wanted to go back to bed, which he did, which is not normal for him, but he thought he'd be able to go to the party and I was okay with that because I didn't want the friend to be disappointed and again, no vomit was forthcoming - I thought maybe he just needed a day of rest. 

So of course, twenty minutes before they're both supposed to leave, they both get all weepy and think they feel nauseous and things head rapidly down hill. I was utterly unable to decide what the right course of action was, and if I had still been solo parenting all three of us might have remained frozen in this miserable tableau for the next five to seven hours. 

Fortunately, Matt got home from the airport just in time to pronounce them neurotic and ridiculous, stomp on their objections, harass them into the truck and drop them off at their various destinations. Eve had a great time at Marianna's, Angus had a great time at the hockey game (at which he consumed two pieces of pizza, two Pepsis and two pieces of cake), and Matt and I caught up on a huge backlog of Modern Family.

Sometimes it's good to be wrong.