Laila: Oh the tangled web we weave...

When I searched on "white lie" on the super information highway, I found two interesting definitions:

n. An often trivial, diplomatic or well-intentioned untruth.

      and

 n : an unimportant lie (especially one told to be tactful or polite)

I love the last one, an "unimportant" lie  : )   Which leads us to our tale.....


Sunday night I sat stressing a little thinking about my Monday and realized I had completely over-extended myself.  The one factor that would alleviate that internal twinge would be to reschedule my daughters swim lessons. I had booked her for a weeks worth of lessons, and realized it would work out much better to switch her to a 5 week, once a week program instead. But before I made the call, I worried about coming across as a flakey, unorganized mom, so I tried to think of an "unimportant" lie to tell, something to put the blame on instead of myself.  Now right there I was already being unimpeccable with my word, I was using it against myself by using the label flakey and the word blame.

As I dialed the number I thought that telling him she was sick was perfect, no one wants a sick kid in  the pool. Plus when a kid is sick you really don't know how long it might last, so I was already getting out of it if he said she could start the next day.  But as soon as the person on the other end answered I blurted out "I've over-extended myself tomorrow and I need to switch my daughters lesson to another time!"  And this relief just washed through me and I actually smiled. The lesson was switched, no problem, and I had a still busy but very manageable Monday.

I'd like to think that the first agreement is getting deep seeded in my psyche so that it is making it impossible for me to tell a lie, however I think there was a little fear thrown in there of possibly being discovered. What if the swim instructor said to Gabby "Glad you are feeling better" - whether Gabby exposed me with her blatant honesty or I exposed myself by turning that nice shade of red some people do when caught in a lie, ultimately I would have felt bad about not being truthful (and what a great example to set).  So I am encouraged that I am able to stop and think about my actions and analyze the impeccability of my word before I throw it out there - something I probably wouldn't have done even a month ago.