mother knows best

have your parents ever confronted you about something that you were sure they didn't know anything about?  did you wonder how they could possibly know anything about it since you obviously didn't tell them? my sophomore year of high school my friends and i were bored so we were driving around town trying to figure out something to do.  as teenagers, naturally, the first thing that came to mind was to toilet paper my best friend's house because we knew she was going to be out of town all weekend.  for quite some time we had been wanting to try "vaselining" and saran-wrapping someone's car, so this was the perfect opportunity.  "vaselining" consists of smearing vaseline under the car's door handles so the owner is greeted with a slimy surprise when they try to open the door.  so we gathered all of the supplies and put the plan into action. we bought the biggest package of toilet paper we could find,  a jar of vaseline and 2 rolls of saran wrap for the car.  just as we were about to finish, several cars drive by so we hit the deck and continued after they passed by.  the vaseline was in place and the car was saran wrapped shut.  all of a sudden we hear sirens and panic, because toilet papering is illegal, so we make a run for the cars and get the hell out of there, even though the sirens were definitely not because of us.  we left the crime scene completely satisfied and couldn't wait until our friend came home to see our excellent job.  the next day, i woke up to 3 or 4 missed calls and a voicemail from the friend that was driving the getaway car.  all the message said was, "dana, we've got trouble.  call me back." my heart finally worked its way out of my stomach and back to my chest and i call him back and he tells me the bad news.  apparently, what we thought was my friend's white acura just so happened to be her next door neighbor's white lexus.  did i mention the next door neighbor and the owner of the lexus just happened to be the assistant to the headmaster of my high school?  needless to say, she had quite a bit of power at our school.  she had parked her car in my friend's driveway to avoid the debris from her roof that was currently getting worked on (oh the irony) and to make it look like someone was home at my friend's house.  i guess she caught us in the act and recognized our driver's car and our high school's required parking lot sticker and traced it back to him.  however, she didn't know who all assisted in the vandalism so naturally i was not going to come clean if i didn't have to.  i guess this idea wasn't shared with the group because before i knew it i was in the dean's office discussing the events that took place.  all this time i hadn't told either of my parents about the incident because i figured i could handle it on my own and avoid extra punishment from them. well the owner of the lexus, aka the assistant to the headmaster, was not a happy camper.  she was doing everything in her power to get my friends and i in the biggest amount of trouble possible, even though there was no permanent damage to her car.  the next thing i knew, parents were being called.  once again, so much for my plan.  but to my surprise, when i overheard my mother on the phone, she knew all about the incident.  i mean every single, minute detail.  when i asked her how she knew all of the information she simply said, "i have my ways.  i'm a mom."  this was not the first time, nor certainly not the last time, i have heard or will hear these words come out of my mother's mouth.  either my mother has esp or she is an even better parent than i could ever imagine...