What did you ever do that got you into trouble with your parents? At school? What were the punishments?
It’s been a really long time since I wrote any Nils History posts (whoa – actually it’s been three and a half years!) and, now that I’m trying to be more active with the blog again, I thought it would be fun to do another. I asked my son to pull a question out of the jar and he looked at a few and then brought me this one and said “I want to find out what you did and how much trouble you got in!” So this one’s for you, Anders.
I was a pretty good kid. I went to church every Sunday, I never stole a car, did drugs, smoked a cigarette, drank alcohol, slept with girls or anything like that. I have told my kids about how I swore for a summer when I was 7 or 10 or thereabouts, but then repented and regretted my potty mouth. So what did I do to get in trouble? Well, I destroyed things to understand how they work, for one thing. My Mom still remembers when I took her brass chandelier and took it apart to see how light bulbs and wiring worked. I recall that this happened but I don’t remember where I got the thing from or what happened to it. I should probably buy my Mom a nice chandelier some day.
I also remember one time my parents got really sharp new scissors and I wanted to test out just how sharp they were, so I cut my Dad’s leather scripture bag handle, scored the front of the microwave (across the display and the buttons) and cut a few other things I shouldn’t have. Why? I was a destructive little man, I suppose. In retrospect, I can’t believe how disrespectful and inconsiderate those things were. I’m sure my Dad was upset but I don’t remember getting yelled at or anything. If one of my kids did that to our things, I think I would send them to a Chinese boarding school. Got that, Anders?!
I’m sure my parents could do a better job at writing this post than me but I also remember coming home later than I said I would (as a teenager) and being grounded for it, taking the car when I wasn’t supposed to and then having to make the dreaded call to my parents when said car broke down far away from home and other fun incidents.
I remember driving to early morning seminary one morning in our Nissan 200SX and going 118 MPH in a 55 MPH zone and getting pulled over at 105 MPH and being charged with some crazy reckless driving charges, having to have my poor Dad drive me to court where I received a fine and court-ordered sentence to drive my sisters wherever they needed to go but to drive nowhere I wanted to go. I remember thinking that didn’t go too badly, all things considered.
In school, I had a bit of a laziness issue. I didn’t much care for waking up in the morning and, as a result, I was tardy 64 times my Senior year in High School. I forged my mom’s signature most days until they started calling her at work every time. I became pretty familiar with the detention room, which was a great place to catch up on sleep. I also remember waking up with pools of drool on the desk and having that nasty string of saliva attaching me to the desk and hoping nobody saw.
So those are some fun memories of getting in trouble. Until next time,
Nils