*Folks have been asking for an update on the “water to the gas tank” incident with our van. Welp. Here ya go.

*Vandals You Own*

I turned my back for one second.

All good parental spiels begin this way, right? Especially if you happen to own a boy human. Or two.

Okay, maybe it wasn’t ONE second, but it was quick. I glanced out the window where my ten year old and seven year old daughters were playing a game in the sprinkler with their four year old twin brothers. They were the very picture of childhood beauty; late afternoon sun dappling their small and slick bodies through the oak leaves, swells of laughter echoing across the green lawn as they frolicked in the shimmering water droplets together.

I finally have time to poop, I thought. So I hot-stepped into the bathroom and took care of business. Upon exit, it was eerily silent outside and there were no sweet little dancing sprites in the sprinkler.

I turned my back for one second…

I ran to the front door, innately feeling the doom deep down in the black hole of my innards. I threw the front door open and wildly swung my head from side to side but saw no one. Then a funny trickling sound pulled my focus a little past the fence and through the gate where the cars are parked.

What dost mine eyes behold on the hood of our family maxi-van?

A butthole.

That’s right. A little naked, four year old boy, butt in the air doing down dog on the hood. I cringe, but this is okay. We live in the sticks on a farm, so no do-gooding hall monitor has called CPS for preschooler indecency. We can recover from this unscathed, I assure myself.

But there’s still the trickling. My eyes scan to the right and see another matching, unclothed boy, this one doing an ancient jig on his tiptoes on the gravel next to the van. Garden hose in hand, water is majestically shooting into the air and plummeting back onto his upturned face. Eyes closed, he gracefully slings water in every direction whilst he prances.

“Wow,” I thought, “they’ve figured out how the hose quick-disconnect works. Grown ups can’t even work those things. They sure are smart!”

Then, I notice the gas tank is open on The Mothership. “Hmm. That’s weird. I’ve seen this before, but I caught them before anything bad happened. Hopefully we’ve dodged that bullet twice or thrice. I’m just going to pretend like that little detail is irrelevant.”

I close up the gas tank, wipe the water off the side of the van with my shirt and herd the little devils inside to put clothes on. In retrospect, I realize that whatever boy ganja the twins smoke everyday has apparently diluted and obliterated any brain cells I had left. Second hand high is real, people. Mom-brain is real.

Fast forward a couple hours later. I jump in the van to run an errand. I barrel happily down the driveway and get about 50 feet when Big Bertha begins to sputter and wheeze and fall down to her knees. Her check engine light flashes erratically. With one last dramatic breath, she dies. My heart sinks as all of the dastardly puzzle pieces fall into place in my seizing brain and I realize that the turddlers did, indeed, fill our gas tank with water.

Anytime they do something like this (which is EVERYDAY), I automatically think of things like the time I threw a glass at my brother but shattered the massive sliding glass door behind him instead of his big head while our house was for sale or poured an entire gallon of milk on the floor of our our motorhome and my parents only knew because they saw milk pouring out the back of the RV into the road through the side mirrors as we drove or the time I took a dump behind my bed when I was five, just to see how it felt to take a dump behind my bed.

I’m reaping what I sowed as a horrible child.

After talking to several repair shops and getting estimates for the damage water can do inside a vehicle fuel system (which made me throw up in my mouth a little bit), it kept ringing in my ears what they said. “Call your insurance. It covers vandalism like water in the gas tank.” I chortled heartily and explained that I don’t think insurance covers vandals that you claim ownership of.

The final shop I talked to insisted I call my insurance. “Trust me lady,” the good ‘ole boy laughed, “We see some crazy sh*t up in here covered by insurance. Get on yer phone.”

Well, guess what? Stephanie, from Progressive politely informed me that our insurance does, in fact, cover vandalism of the wettest sort, even if the vandals are your own flesh and blood and completed the vandalism naked, dancing, and with their buttholes in the air.

So, for those of you I’ve judged because your kids dumped exterior house paint all over the living room or wrote on the baby’s face with Sharpie or covered your kitchen with homemade poop and flour pancakes, I tip my hat to you and humbly offer my sincerest apology.

I will now sit down to my favorite meal of roasted crow.

May we all poop in peace, with confidence, joy and assurance that no one ends up doing naked yoga and no maxi-vans get harmed during your one second vacation on the toilet.

*Newest twin talent: Catch the 25 year old pony who’s not fast enough to evade them, put him into the cattle chute and pretend to be rodeo kings while mom poops.