As for me and my house....

I believe that I've previously mentioned my oldest daughter's propensity for cop-ness. She's constantly monitoring the activities of the homefront and reporting back to me. Okay, I'm churching it up. She can be a real bossy tattle-tale.

I wish I could say that this is confined to home, but it's not. I feel sorry for any child who breaks the rules in front of Madam Officer. In an effort to keep her from alienating other children I told her that if she sees someone doing something naughty she should just whisper it into her hand, put that in her pocket and save it to tell to me when she gets home. From my end it appears to be working because I get daily "pocket reports" after school.

Now, it's only natural that a child with such a rule following tendency should find herself a huge fan of the concept of good vs. evil. She is completely captivated by the showdown between good and bad. And she wants to be planted firmly on the side of good. Well, GOOD for her! (If I hadn't birthed her I'd wonder if she was mine!)

And yet, knowing ALL of this about her, I was still caught completely off-guard by a conversation we had this morning.

Ms. Els: Mom, Friend did something really bad. She lied to her Mom and brought something to school that she was supposed to keep at home.
Me: Oh, that's too bad. It's not good to disobey your Mom. (sweet plug there!)
Ms. Els: Yep, when you do stuff like that you're serving the devil.

Please tell me you're as shocked here as I was. I kind of laughed but managed to stifle it before she noticed. Speaking of the devil - What... the... DEVIL??

Me: Excuse me?
Ms. Els: Ya, if you do bad stuff you're choosing to serve the devil.
Me: You learn that at church?
Ms. Els: Yep.
Me: Okay, well, I can tell you that it definitely isn't good to lie and sneak around. And Satan does want us to make bad choices. But, I'm sure Friend will try harder next time.

(The way Els made it sound you'd think Friend was on her way to a human sacrifice after school!)

The entire thing has left me somewhere between feeling proud of Els and her commitement to fight for good, and scared of what she must think of me! I mean, I can be a pretty huge hypocrite what with my yelling at them to stop yelling, my spanking them when they hit each other, my making them eat carrots while I'm eating a snickers bar.

Either way, I've had a flash of the future and I believe she'll be spending a lot of time holding protest signs and petition forms. Because someday that pocket of hers is going to overflow and she just won't be able to stay quiet in the face of evil.

Now, if she could just rub off on me a little bit....