Lies of my Childhood

"If there's one thing I hate", my father always said, back when fatherly advice still seemed infallible, "it's liars". Now, despite internalizing the advice, I distinctly remember being a little skeptical. Out of all the things in the world one can hate; rapists, drug addicts, murders, pedophiles, or fat people, for example, my father chose liars. Of course back then, I wasn't a very good liar. But I was so friggin' cute, I reckoned, that no one would really care.

One day, I found a box of my mom's sanitary pads (it's 2010, let's get over the oppressive, societal ick towards feminine products, sil vou plait). Being 4, I of course had no idea what they were, but infomercials taught me that waxing could be completely painless (although I don't think I had grasped the fact that waxing was to remove hair: rather, I assumed it was just a thing adults did to pass the time). Being 4, I had no way of distinguishing between sanitary pads, and the pads women used for waxing. Being 4, no one could really blame me, and that's the way I choose to remember it. Needless to say, my mother was horrified to find me in the hallway, slumped over a box of pads, intently applying the white sticky things to my arms and legs.

Now had I known how to lie efficiently, I would have scapegoated my siblings. It's easy enough to use my brother in this way: he was born evil. My grandparents, with their vivid but exaggerated memories, always a recalled a time when my brother, a lanky, squeaky boy of 5, threatened to burn their entire house down. Had I said that my brother was responsible for the sanitary pads, my parents would have forgotten about my fall from grace, and beat the crap out of my brother. Like I said, though, I didn't know how to lie, and the lie I came up with went something like "ummm so I saw lizards on the walls, and I was protecting myself from them", except not in English, but a lisped Filipino, and instead of sounding like a full, practiced sentence, it sounded like lies were spewing from my mouth.

In Elementary, I wasn't much better. Inspired by public bathroom graffiti and a newfound appreciation for permanent markers, I inscribed my phone number on the school bathroom door, stating "For a good time, please call!". My 9 year old self had an inkling that "a good time" didn't mean what I thought it meant, but I wasn't willing to risk the loss of a good time. I remember being pulled aside by my miserable classroom teacher, and being interrogated right in the bathroom stall. "What is this, Jayo!?", she sternly said.
"I'm not sure...a phone number. Wow, this is naughty"

"This wasn't you?"

"No way ho-zay!"

"Even though it's your phone number?"

"I...don't think so"

"It is, we checked"

"Maybe...whoever did this, they found out my phone number and put it there"

"Ummm", said the teacher, not making a very good attempt at veiling her rage. She was one of those new age behaviorist teachers, and she didn't want to show her anger lest it be modeled onto her students. I'm not sure if it worked, but I still learned the ways of effective passive-aggression that year. She obviously didn't believe me, but she wasn't about to accuse an adorable child of a misdemeanor. Instead, she walked away and said "interesting", and that was that. I placed the sharpie that I used, which was still in my pocket, to the wall with the wall's used gum deposits, and went about my merry way. I would then go on to scam my best friend out of 75 cents, and help the ADHD kid buy some friends with paper airplanes.