Cliché Revival: Diplomatic Teaching Tool
Posted: Friday, May 25, 2007
by Mary Fagan
Motherwise
Pre-ramble - We, as parents in the paternal state, in order to form our children into more perfect offspring, establish our justice, insure domestic tranquility, produce no regrets, promote their general welfare and secure blessings for them as our posterity, do ordain and establish that we have the constitution for showing them what’s good for them whether they like it or not by using any means possible, including quoting clichés that they say are no longer applicable but we consider true esoterica.
Now I ask you. my little lost flock, is it enough to preserve our own wits as we watch as those around us stumble through life when the path has already been clearly marked out? No, we cannot. We are called to remove the blinders from those as stubborn as mules and keep them from exposing their worst side to the rest of us and so that we don’t have to fight the urge to call out loud, “O Lord, I told you so!"
All raise in praise from the cliché coma! Yes, I said coma, the four-letter formula with the power to break it down and tell it like it is. Follow the letters and like Lazarus, you too can show your children the light. Heed the messages behind the C, O, M, and A and their saving force.
I now call forth some powerful clichés. They will show you how they can lead children to the light, out of the COMA:
First Call -
C = Cliché - You made your bed, now sleep in it.
O = Origin - Rejection by a mother of helping a child find an easy way out due to the fact that she is sick of reminding said child not to do that thing and all the million reasons they should not, taking the trouble to go into excruciating detail of all the consequences. She is just plain exhausted, needs a bed and wants some sleep.
M = Meaning - You did the thing, now deal with it. Or - why should I clean up your mess when you had fair warning (make that strobe lights and sirens) of the consequences?
A = Application - Pay your own fines. Speeding down Main Street in a town the size of Mayberry that has a 7-man police force is dumb because your chances of going unnoticed are slim to none. Save yourself and slow down. That’s the ticket!
Second Call -
C = Cliché - You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink.
O = Origin - Horses need water. People would bring water to them, but being of limited intelligence, they would sometimes refuse even though they needed to drink.
M = Meaning - It’s easy to show people what they need, It is a lot harder to make them see it is smart to do it. And if that should come to pass, it is even harder to get them to actually do it. Both are bloody unlikely to occur.
A = Application - With children, this would be your attempts and offers to help start their six-month project more than two hours before it’s due. With adults, it can be their refusal to use the nicotine patch you have left on their dresser for two years or pointing out they have been driving on empty for the last six miles and the last open gas station is just ahead.
Gracious friends, we see the wisdom of those who learned the hard way. Resurrect the cliché and save your children today!
In closing, let us say:
Oh pearls of wisdom, precious and fair, help us to teach those who just don’t care.
Provide us with the alternate text to say, “I told you so" in a more diplomatic way.
Call them from the coma, awaken their senses, as we use this simple formula to hide our pretenses.
For judgment will be swift and we fear it,
And when it comes to troubles you brought on yourself, most people really don’t want to hear it.
Again.
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Top-level comments on this article: (5 total)Thanks Mary. I love your style and wit.Thank you and I appreciate your good taste!
hi mary, i enjoyed your piece, especially the different way it looked from most uniformed stories. i smiled at a few sentences i could definitley relate to. thanks, best regards, sue thomGlad you mentioned the style thing, Sue. I was a little worried that it would be hard to read, and I am glad to get your feedback. Best regards to you too and I am happy that you got a smile or two today - Mary.
Hey Mary! I'm in! I think I'll go try "Pretty is as pretty does" or possibly "A bird in the hand is worth 2 in the bush", oh wait "Let's cross that bridge when we come to it" maybe when I'm a little grumpy I'll dig up "Let sleeping dogs lie" .... Oh the list is endless! Thanks for the awakening! :-)Mercy! You are so right. I had a couple that I didn't add (why buy the cow if you can get the milk for free). Thanks, Pretty!
I laughed out loud! And at the beginning, I found myself singing your first paragraph to the tune of the Schoolhouse Rock that was so popular years ago. Thanks!I loved Schoolhouse Rock (especially Conjunction Junction, What's Your Function?) and I am glad you had a good laugh. I never thought of putting the closing to music...hmm. My kids already think I am a bit nutty so I have nothing to lose!
Mary, thanks for a great laugh -- this article is terrific! Just this morning, before I even read your article, I had said to my step-son, "Well, you made your own bed, now sleep in it'... never realized it and now I'm laughing -- thanks!You are certainly welcome for the laugh. By the sounds of things, you didn't even need a reminder to use this diplomatic teaching tool - you're a natural! Take care - Mary
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