I, Violet Newton, may have been just about the most manipulative child in the Midwest.

It all started when I realized the power I held in my Pre-K classroom. One day I told a group of my closest friends that I would be having a party that night and they could all be invited if, and only if, they followed two simple rules:

1. They were to no longer like horses (this was particularly devastating for the girl whose entire stationary set was horse-themed).

2. They absolutely could not use the word cute.

They fell for my devious scheme and adhered to my rules. Unfortunately, for them, there was in fact no party, just an oddly petty 4-year-old.

In another instance, the following week I was playing with the toy dinosaurs with my very best friend. Unfortunately for her, there was one wooden dinosaur mixed into the other plastic dinosaurs. So, as anyone would do, I ordered her to take the wooden one and take it home because there was simply no other option as it didn’t fit in with the rest.

Poor Mackenna shoved the dinosaur into her backpack, everything was perfect. The dinosaurs were sorted correctly, and everyone was bending to my will – until her mom went through her backpack that night and found the dinosaur. She grilled Mackenna about where it was from. But Mackenna knew better than to blame me and ended up taking the blame and writing the teacher an apology note.