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larkandkatydid:
My boss slaughters his egg chickens either every fall or every other fall depending on how old they are when he gets them, on the logic that the personal hassle and carbon foot print of getting chickens to lay eggs in the winter is not worth it. As he was explaining this recently, a newer co-worker asked how he hid that from his children. And she’s new, which means she’s never had the delightfully goth experience of watching my boss’s two charming dimpled daughters who are ALSO deeply unsentimental farm children respond to you with utterly withering scorn if you ask them something like, as I once did, “oh, what’s that chicken’s name?” The oldest daughter, all of four years old at the time, told me in a firm, Wednesday-Adams-talking-to-a-moron voice, “We’re going to eat them. They’re not pets.”
My boss, who is gentle and does not respond to people with scorn when they ask innocent questions, instead told her, “Oh, we’re pretty open with them about the facts of life. They know where babies come from and where chickens go.”
Anyway, that phrase haunts me and I wanted to share it with you. It sounds like some 19th century grandma saying.
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larkandkatydid:
My boss slaughters his egg chickens either every fall or every other fall depending on how old they are when he gets them, on the logic that the personal hassle and carbon foot print of getting chickens to lay eggs in the winter is not worth it. As he was explaining this recently, a newer co-worker asked how he hid that from his children. And she’s new, which means she’s never had the delightfully goth experience of watching my boss’s two charming dimpled daughters who are ALSO deeply unsentimental farm children respond to you with utterly withering scorn if you ask them something like, as I once did, “oh, what’s that chicken’s name?” The oldest daughter, all of four years old at the time, told me in a firm, Wednesday-Adams-talking-to-a-moron voice, “We’re going to eat them. They’re not pets.”
My boss, who is gentle and does not respond to people with scorn when they ask innocent questions, instead told her, “Oh, we’re pretty open with them about the facts of life. They know where babies come from and where chickens go.”
Anyway, that phrase haunts me and I wanted to share it with you. It sounds like some 19th century grandma saying.
(Your picture was not posted)
no subject
Date: 2019-01-01 09:10 pm (UTC)Do you remember the song about the crocodile and the monkeys? And the one about the old lady who swallowed the fly? I can't count the number of versions I've found online that gentle the endings - the monkeys get away, the old lady burps up everything she's eaten and doesn't die . . .
When I do the originals, the kids are like, "DUH you tease a crocodile, he's gonna eat you, that story checks out." or "DUH, you eat a horse you're gonna die. Hello." It's the parents that are always looking horrified.
no subject
Date: 2019-01-03 12:51 pm (UTC)I think Neil Gaiman has some reflections like that about Coraline-- like, kids love the book but adults are terrified of it?? Something like that.
I get so tired of reading kids' books where Magically, Everything Turns Out Fine! and there is no real fear and everything is toothless. It condescends to kids. It's partly because I was sick of, like, Olivia The Pig Does Something Selfish But It Works Out Anyway for the umpty-zillionth time that I started reading adult novels to Farmkid. She can hang, so she does. And sometimes, bad things happen. And that's how the world works, and crucially, she already knows that, because kids know stuff.