You be the Judge

When I went to pick Ben and Jake up from preschool yesterday, the first thing one of the teachers did was ask me if we owned four dogs. Excuse me? Apparently they had been talking about dogs in class, and the boys informed everyone fairly convincingly that we owned four dogs. I set the teacher straight on exactly how many dogs we owned (one), and she just laughed hysterically and walked off.

Later that afternoon I tried to figure out exactly what the dialogue had been in preschool.

"Jake, Ben, how many dogs did you tell your preschool teacher we have?"

"Four dogs," Ben answered promptly.

Instant pandemonium ensued as both clamored for my attention, each trying to say the most outrageous thing. The following are the only sentences I actually understood.

"I have 69 dogs!" exclaimed Jake, a look of Beat that! on his face.

"I have LOTS OF MONEY!" countered Ben.

Now that was even more of a lie than the one about the dogs.

"Well, Ben, what are you going to do with all that money?" I asked.

"I go to the pet store, and I buy lots of puppy dogs and kitty cats and TURTLES!"

Don't we all wish life was that simple again? When what we said was what we truly believed? When what we dreamed of felt so close that in our hearts, it was already real?

Or maybe they're just a couple of pathological liars in the making.

Who knows?