Lies Your Mother (and/or Father) Told You ...
 

You know what I mean ... family or folk stories that your parents told you with perfectly straight faces to explain something to you or to keep you from engaging in some sort of bad behavior. We'll take Santa and the Easter Bunny as givens, and in fact they've been discussed else where.

I mean stuff like this:

Thunder results from God and the Angels having bowling league night in Heaven.

Potatoes will grow in (or behind) your ears if you don't clean them.

If you swallow a watermelon seed it will grow inside your stomach.

You know, that sort of thing.

Got any good ones?

They told me if I ate my vegetables and studied hard I could do anything I wanted when I grew up.

those are all lies? shit *immediately calls therapist*

Eating the crusts of my bread would make my hair curly. If you cross your eyes they'll be stuck that way, wearing your shirt inside-out will make it rain, and, the biggie: my mom always telling us three girls that she had a recipe for Little Girl Soup, so we'd better shape up! My mother also used to warn us: "When your father gets home you are going to get the devil!" And, honey, we always DID.

My father was so completely full of shit, I can't recall all the things he told me that were outrageous, yet he swore to their truth.

I expect this is exactly what my children will say if asked the same question in about 20 years.

I think of this often, and mention it, when I see people at work wearing green foam ear plugs.:D

My mother told me our family was normal.

Someone once mentioned that their parents told them that the ice cream van played music to let you know that it had sold out of ice cream so you wouldn't waste time flagging it down. So when our (little) kids asked why that van was playing music, we couldn't resist (could barely keep straight faces either)..... a couple of years later middle son pipes up "look they just got ice cream from that van, they mustn't know the music means it hasn't got any!" :redface: Never thought they'd believe us. Now they're just really unsure about the whole thing. We are bad, bad parents.

Not to worry, monster. When my son was very young he pointed to an electricity pole and asked his father what is was. Dad told him, "It's an electric tree!"

Jacquelita said she told a few precious ones to her kids.

- If you fart really hard it will blow out the seams in your pants.

- The fog on the car windows is caused by bad breath.

She says the kids still get confused about the car window fog. :D

I keep my lies in the realms of politics and religion, of course they're the same ones I tell myself.

I was told that I was found under a rock on the beach.

If I beat off, I will go blind.

If you get up after bed time the monster under your bed willl get you.

That I won't always be annoyed with my younger brother.

That most siblings get along.

told to boys: "that will make you go blind"

what a lie, if it were true all men would be blind!

Swallow your gum and your insides stick together.

Let the scab come off your vaccination and you get smallpox.

Drinking coffee while you are a kid will make you turn black.