A Little Lie is OK, Right?

Original Publication Date: January 23, 2011 (Minor changes made to makes the story clearer!)

Apparently, it’s not if you’re 5 years old. Sheesh, I was put on the spot, had to explain myself, and then had to lie some more to fix it.

Situation: My family and I were heading up to Cypress Mountain to celebrate a friend’s birthday by snow-tubing. This is an insane activity where you sit on an inflated rubber tube and slide down a steep hill at high speed. Frankly, there were moments I thought I might dislocate my shoulder.

Back to the story: Since this was my 2nd or 3rd time up the mountain, I decided to use OnStar (a person-to-person GPS service offered by GMC) to find the fastest route. While speaking to my "personal advisor", I mentioned that we were heading up to the mountains for some skiing!

Explanation: Aha, do you see the problem here? I said "skiing" instead of snow-tubing. As you might guess, this prompted my 5-year-old daughter, bless her truthfulness, to yell from the back seat, “Daddy, we’re not going skiing! We’re going snow-tubing,” all while I was still on the call with the advisor. Of course, I turned around and motioned for my daughter to be quiet because I didn’t want to embarrass myself by admitting to the OnStar advisor that we were going snow-tubing. I mean, really, who lives in Canada and doesn’t know how to ski? Oh, I know!!! Me!

While I was shushing my daughter, the advisor downloaded the route to my GPS, wished us a safe trip (probably laughing on the other end), and hung up. That’s when my daughter repeatedly told me that I shouldn’t have lied and that I should call back and apologize. Apparently, apologizing to her wasn’t enough because she wouldn’t drop it.

Lies, lies, and more lies: Realizing it was a lost battle with my daughter and that calling OnStar back wouldn’t solve the problem since I’d likely speak to a different advisor, I ended the conversation with another lie: “Honey, you’re right… I shouldn’t have lied! I promise to send OnStar an email first thing in the morning to apologize and let them know we went snow-tubing and not skiing.”

I promise to set the record straight one day!

My commitment: I will no longer lie or exaggerate the truth! I just won’t say what’s on my mind. ??

Thanks for reading!

P.S. I hope my daughter will be as adamant about telling the truth when she’s a teenager!