Darren Dean: My egg baby

My senior year of high, we had to have an egg baby. We had to have this child for a week. Any cracks in said child, and we were found guilty of child abuse. If the egg baby was neglected or kidnapped, we were found guilty of endangerment or neglect.

Our punishment was one I wanted to avoid AT ALL COSTS. We would have to wear a sign around our neck that said something witty like "ASK ME HOW I ABUSE MY CHILD" or "CHILD ABUSER" or "I NEGLECT MY CHILD."

I did have an incident with my Darren one day and he suffered a crack (these were hollowed eggs). However, my mother knew that such a punishment at school would be The End of Me. We couldn't create a new baby because each egg had been stamped by the teacher. So my mom and my grandma conspired to clothe Darren. By the end of the night, Darren had a cute, red, plaid diaper.

Darren got injured because I was stupid. I would also like to point out that had Darren been an ACTUAL child, said incident would never have occurred. See, I carried Darren around in a little wicker basket. I need to squeeze between the car and the deep freeze. I often raised my arms above my head to accomplish this feat. But this evening, I had a basket in my hand. Force of habit being what it is, I raised my arms above my head, the basket was upside down, and down Darren came.

Oops.

After All the Queens had put Darren back together again (get it?), Darren went to his first hockey game. There, I informed one of his namesakes that he had an egg named after him. Let me tell you, professional athletes get freaked out about the TINIEST things.

I think we actually had it easy. My mom (she taught Family Relations and Parenting as part of her home-ec curriculum) made her students carry five-pound flour sacks. Of course, she preferred that they clothe them, etc. And, like my class, they had to account for their baby-sitting time, etc., if they left the child anywhere.

Then she got these fake babies approved. Babies that actually cried at random intervals. You shut the baby up by putting a key in the baby's back, turning it, and holding it there for a set amount of time (so you couldn't just put the key in, turn the child on it's stomach, and leave it). AND this had a device in it that would tell Mom for how long the baby cried before it was "fed" or "comforted."

Her favourite story is when one of her students complained. "Mrs. Phillips, people on the bus look at me funny. I've got my baby, my diaper bag, my stroller, plus this fake baby, my backpack... "

It was a fun project. I wish the punishment hadn't been public humiliation, though. I FEARED wearing one of those signs, and not in a good way.

Kind of like when we had to do The Marriage Project and I couldn't find someone to fake marry me. I managed to tell the teacher without crying, but Jody didn't.

Of course, she's married now and I'm not, so there ya go.