Fremdschämen - Look It Up

Yes, living a life this way can be embarrassing. It's even worse when your parents write about it.

            If you’re an avid WhatMyKidSays reader, you may have had a hard time getting out of bed because you noticed I haven’t blogged in the past few weeks. I suppose I’ve hit a bit of writer’s block. And possibly since Chris hit her 7^th birthday she’s not nearly as funny as she was the first six years of life. Or possibly since she hit her 7^th birthday I’ve hit a funk realizing the time is going by too quickly.

            We also had a discussion in the car the other day about the blog and Chris told me flat out that she hates it and wishes I never wrote another word about her because it’s sooooooooo embarrassing. I lied a little and said nobody was laughing at her – just laughing at the funny things kids say – but she wasn’t buying it and made sure I knew what a horrible parent I was becoming.

So cute. But she seems
more angry than humiliated.

Honestly, I did pause for a minute and wonder if I was causing irreparable emotional and mental trauma to my child. In fact, I’m sure since the internet is pretty much here forever there will be all kinds of trauma in about 10 years, right around Prom time when she might sit down and actually read some of the crazy stories about her life.

Ultimately, though, I decided this is my revenge. People keep telling me that with a mouth and personality like Chris’, I am going to be in for some serious trouble in a few years. So, yes, this is my pre-emptive revenge and despite her protestations I probably won’t stop.

It can be humiliating when you
don't know how to eat cake.

I do completely understand Chris’ feelings of embarrassment, though. In fact, I feel a little embarrassed myself sometimes that this child is what I created. I recently learned a new word – fremdschämen - which is a German word meaning external shame. In essence, it stands for the embarrassment that others feel on your behalf, vicariously even, for the humiliating things you may have done or said.

For instance, I am fremdschämen that Chris loves to paint her fingernails in bright prostitute colors (no other color description is available or even necessary because you get the picture – her nails look like a hooker’s talons). But it's not like she cares that much about her appearance since I have to beg, plead and threaten to get her to brush her teeth. And she has worse gas than a sailor living on a ration of canned beans.

I am fremdschämen that when she took her first swimming lessons Chris swallowed so much water that the instructor couldn’t help but sarcastically comment that she would never drown because she could burp so well. Chris didn’t get it and replied, “I know. I’m really, really good at burping.” It’s a skill she might not find embarrassing, but which causes me much embarrassment when she’s in the middle of an important book report in front of her class. I have visions of her giving a valedictory address and turning it into a rendition of Will Farrell’s ‘Elf’ on soda.

I am fremdschämen that when I sent Chris with money for her school’s book fair, she returned home with “Bieber Fever”, a pictorial about the life and times of Justin Bieber. Complete embarrassment. Again, she has no idea that 7-year-old girls are pretty much the only people in the entire world who don’t recognize the humiliation factor of crushing on The Biebs.

It should be embarrassing to be in love with a frog. But, alas, she's not embarrassed.

I am fremdschämen that because Chris has lived her entire life in Arizona, she does not believe that snow falls from the sky, but that it gets trucked in to areas where kids play, like the zoo. On a trip up north last year she was so devastated that no white stuff was on the ground that she begged me to “call them and tell them to bring the trucks!”

I am so, so fremdschämen that I duck down in the driver’s seat on afternoons when I pick her up from school because Chris can’t leave the circle drive without hanging halfway out the car window yelling goodbye to all the friends with whom she has literally just spent the last eight hours. And if they don’t hear her she will yell louder, wave her hands in the air, and hang farther out the window until her mostly clean shirt is covered with a layer of dirt that once covered our traveling trash can.

Speaking of clean shirts, I’m fremdschämen that Chris can’t eat a meal without dripping something onto herself and am sad to inform her that I know from personal experience that she might as well purchase a bib to carry her through the next 50 years. I can always tell what she has had for lunch but she doesn’t seem to care that her clothing is usually a walking abstract painting.

And I’m fremdschämen that Chris is stuck in this family, where we think it’s hilarious to point out one another’s embarrassing habits. My mother always had this saying about adversity, “it builds character.” I always used to tell her, “I have character coming out of my ears.”

I believe blogging about things that Chris finds embarrassing, or the things that she doesn’t find embarrassing but make me cringe on her behalf, is going to help her builds tons of character too. She should be thanking me, right? Right? I will keep telling myself this until the therapist asks her to confront me for ruining her life.

The first bikini will probably be a source of embarrassment soon.