My eldest son was 5 years old when I discovered his first attempt at a cover-up. I had just finished cutting up vegetables to make with dinner and opened the cupboard beneath the kitchen sink to dispose of the cuttings in the trash. I saw his lunch bag in the garbage. I picked it up; his sandwich was still wrapped in saran wrap, not a bite missing.
He was playing with his toys in the living room. “Honey, did you eat your lunch today?” “Yeah,” he called back. “Are you sure?” “Yeah,” he answered. I began to think, does this child think I’m crazy and I won’t notice his lunch bag on the top of the trash? I began pondering the situation. Should I be pleased that he wasn’t sneaky enough to consider dropping it in the trash at school or even burying it beneath other trash in our kitchen? I had to address the situation, if not for the cover-up at least to make sure that he was being nourished.
I called him into the kitchen. He had no clue why I called him in there. Had I not given birth to him myself I would have wondered if he was really mine. “Is that your lunch?” He looked inside the garbage and looked up at me without blinking and said, “No.” “Are you telling me the truth? Because it’s important for little boys to each their lunches or they might get a tummy ache.” He drew a deep breath, prepared to stick to his story, and added, “Well, if I was that little boy I’d tell my mom I don’t like bologna sandwiches anymore, but I ate all my lunch.” And off he went. I decided to let him save face.
What I still can’t get over to this very day is the fact that once he threw it out, even though it was in plain view, to him it was forever gone as if it never existed. Would there have been a point to brand him with an LD (lunch dumper) on his t-shirts similar to the large red “A” used to punish and humiliate Hester Prynne in A Scarlett Letter? I hardly think that approach would have done either of us any good and it certainly would not have accomplished what grace ended up producing. The legalistic approach would have laid a foundation for guilt and I didn’t want to encourage him to become more adept in his deception.
As adults, many of us often give this unmerited favour to children without a second thought. I have to confess that I have been guilty of not always extending this same grace to other adults. I think, as adults, we sometimes think everyone should be held to the same standards. The truth is, we are not all from the same place and we’re not all in the same place but we’re all supposed to end up in the same place. No one can get there alone, or on their own merit.
Hester Prynne ended up putting the scarlet letter back on. We don’t have to. Our letters have been permanently removed, as if they never existed. It seems only right that we clothe others in the same grace that covers us rather than clothing them with a scarlet letter.
