Getting in trouble

One of Elysha’s friends called and said that she “got in trouble” for changing her child’s swim diaper on the chairs surrounding the pool. My initial reaction:

Was she kicked out of the swim club?

Suspended from using the pool for a certain length of time?

Fined?

No, it turns out that the lifeguard explained their rule and asked her not to do it again.

I’ve come to realize that “getting in trouble” means different things to different people depending upon their life experience, and this disparity can begin as far back as grade school.

Once you get caught by the police in a tree, armed with your mother’s camera in order to spy on an all-girl pool party, you really can’t get in trouble with a teacher for not doing your homework again.

Once the police raid your off-campus college party and threaten to arrest you, you really can’t get in trouble with your mother for skipping out on grandma’s birthday party.

Once you are arrested for a crime that you didn’t commit, locked up in jail and subsequently placed on trial, you really can’t get in trouble with a lifeguard for just about anything.

Even changing a swim diaper in public.

As I have said many, many times, context is everything.