The Mom Scene

On a recent afternoon, I texted my wife to see how her day was going. And this was her response.

6:38 am: 6:38, 6:38, 6:38. Everyday this kid wakes up at 6:38. It’s like we’re in a ratings-desperate spin-off of Lost and the numbers 6-3-8 are super important but no one knows why. Not 6:37, no thank you. 6:40? Poppycock! I will rise at 6:38 every morning, regardless of the time I fell asleep the night before, and you will begin catering to my every whim. Got it, lady?

6:38 and 29 seconds: I scoop up Little Brother and hurry him out of the room before he wakes his big brother, who occasionally and awesomely sleeps ALL THE WAY UNTIL 7:30 AM.

6:39 am: Consider the alternative, to let him wake up the Doozer, lock them both in the room with a box of cereal and go back to bed. Decide that this is probably bad parenting, no matter how tempting.

7:00 am: We settle down with a large mug of black coffee and diluted apple juice in a sippy cup for a thought-provoking episode of Max and Ruby, in which Max derails Ruby’s attempt at organic, artisanal beauty products by eating her supplies. Ponder a business venture (run by cartoon bunnies) in which a locavore and a craftswoman could work together harmoniously.

7:12 am: Recall that when I was first pregnant, I thought I wouldn’t let my kids watch television. Snort audibly at my prenatal naïveté.

7:30 am: Shower. Alone. With the door closed. A cherished luxury made possible only because my husband’s new commute is shorter than the old one and he no longer leaves the house by 7.

7:45 am: Exit the bathroom to find the Doozer awake. I begin warning them both that we will have to go to Target this morning. Words I will repeat 300 times over the next hour and still, they will both act shocked and horrified when I herd them upstairs to get dressed after breakfast.

8:00 am: Make breakfast.

8:05 am: Call the kids to breakfast.

8:06 am: Call the kids to breakfast.

8:07 am: Call the kids to breakfast.

8:08 am: Call the kids to breakfast.

8:09 am: Pee.

8:11 am: Call the kids to breakfast REALLY LOUDLY while physically prying toys from their chubby little fingers.

8:13 am: Unload the dishwasher and try to explain to a 2-year-old why he can’t have the blue plate for every meal and that his breakfast will taste just as good on the orange plate. Continue this conversation throughout the duration of breakfast, getting washed up, brushing teeth, getting dressed. Try to decide if we could avoid future iterations of this conversation by eliminating all the blue plates from the house, or by getting only blue dishes forever and ever until we die.

9:50 am: Load everyone into the car with the 900 things they need to take a 1-mile trip and realize I forgot to eat breakfast. Hunger is totally fine. I don’t need food.

9:57 am:   Head into Target, where we [REDACTED] until we agree to [REDACTED]. Continue our shopping trip when [REDACTED] and I plead for [REDACTED] until I give up, drive home, and try to decide which neighboring town’s Target is closer, since we’ve been [REDACTED].

12:11 pm: I sit down at the lunch table with the boys. Not to eat, mind you. I don’t eat meals sitting down LIKE A HUMAN BEING anymore. Just to sit down, while the one who likes food is distracted by a plateful of it and the one who doesn’t care a whole hell of a lot for food (not my child) is physically strapped to his chair for the next 20 minutes.

12:14 pm: A carefully sliced grape-half tumbles to the floor and bounces off my big toe. I ignore it.

12:15 pm: "Mama! A gwape! On the floor! Mama!! A gwape is on the floor!" I am stone-faced. I welcome and appreciate the opportunity to ignore your ridiculous emergency.

12:17 pm: The clouds in the sky today remind me of one of our wedding photos, taken almost 9 years ago. I think about that perfect fall day in Michigan, crisp and sun-warmed all at the same time, friends and family and love and food and drink and promises of family and unity and TOGETHERNESS.

12:19 pm: Regret it. I could have been a nun! I could have gone to culinary school in Paris! I could have toiled on a fishing boat in Alaska, which probably includes the added and totally awesome bonus of never having to shave one’s legs! I could have slaved away at an unassuming desk job for an a-hole boss for a hundred years until I died without fanfare, but at least I could have EATEN MEALS SITTING DOWN.

12:22 pm: The big one gets the little one’s grape from under the table and asks me in earnest whether it can be rinsed off or if I can get him a new one. (The big one’s a good person. He’s my child. This other one fell off a turnip truck and rolled onto our front lawn. “Please, can we keep him, please? PLEEEEEEEEASE?” “Uh, he’s kinda cute. Sure.”)

12:23 pm: That would be funny if it was my actual birth story.

12:24 pm: Slice more grapes in half, wash knife. My life is repeating itself, only not in a cool Groundhog Day sort of way, just in a really mundane, no one enjoys halving grapes THE FIRST TIME kind of way.

12:35 pm: Wash. More. Dishes. Again.

1:00 pm: Read, cuddle, coerce, threaten the little one to take a nap. Promise the big one I will play table hockey with him if he gives me ten minutes to relax first. Ensure ten minutes of quiet time by letting him play Angry Birds on my phone.

1:50 pm: Check email, Facebook. I learn that if I had not quit my previous job when I was pregnant, I would currently, at this very moment in time, be hanging out with the Foo Fighters at work. This was the kind of job where, if you were having a craptastic day, someone would grab a bottle of whiskey and a couple of glasses out of the kitchen, and shortly you’d have obtained enough liquid perspective to get through the rest of the day.

2:00 pm: Settle in for the fifth consecutive day of our Naptime Classic table hockey tournament. Try not to sob openly about my parallel life, the one in which I’m presently shooting the breeze with Dave Grohl and Pat Smear.

2:25 pm: I declare the Doozer champion, magnanimously neglect to tell him that I let him win, and set him up with some Legos so I can get some work done in the brief but wondrous window of time that is the Afternoon Nap. When the little one gives up his Afternoon Nap, you may just find me wandering under a freeway overpass, half-dressed and disoriented. Don’t send help. It’s better for everyone this way.

2:26 pm: You texted to ask how my day was going.

I Believe the Children Are Our Future

It’s true. They are. I don’t quibble with that. The late, great Whitney was onto something. It’s the second part of her sentiment that troubles me.

Teach them well and let them lead the way.

Here’s the problem. As a parent, I spend a great deal of time feeling like Nick Burns, your company’s computer guy.

Now, I’m aware that teaching kids is an important part of being a parent. It might be the most important part. And it’s supposed to teach you about patience and empathy and understanding. None of the above. If anything, I feel like it’s made me less patient. Less understanding.

Move!

They’re just so slow. And sloppy. And erratic. All the time.

They’re doing it wrong. To my mind, they’ve taken “You’re doing it wrong” to a whole new level. Given it a whole new meaning. You’re doing everything wrong. Their incompetence, inability to follow simple directions (or even to just hear, sometimes), frustrates me to no end. 

Also, I'm just kind of lazy. Teaching is annoying and I have no interest. But also, they don’t want to learn. They just want to screw around and smack me in the face.

Yes, I will feed a kid to avoid picking up spilled food. I will pick up toys because I’m tired of the room being cluttered. I will tie shoes rather than instruct how to tie shoes.

It’s like that old saying, if you want something done right . . .

“They are children,” my wife constantly reminds me.

“I don’t care,” I reply. “They should know better.”

My expectations are not that high. I want them to remain adorable small children who possess the grooming habits and basic life skills of fully functional adults. Is that so much to ask?

Never mind, I have to go organize 900 bins of toys.

Me Time

When you’re a family, you share everything. Space, meals, the TV. Good times and bad times. And sickness. Oh, the humanity. The sickness.

Like the world’s worst game of tag, illnesses pass between kids, from kids to parents, from parents to kids. They just tear through the populace like a plague. Literally. You spend so much time teaching your kids to share and then all of a sudden you wish you could make it stop. 

And you can’t.

We had our share of sickness this summer. Having sick kids is pretty horrendous. I mean, more than usual. But at the same time, I am always amazed by how quickly they bounce back from it. Perhaps the clearest indication of a sick kid is watching their energy go from a level of about 5,000 to zero. Immediately. Then it’s always incredible when you are able to give them some relief from their predicament.

Just one dose of Tylenol and suddenly they’re flying off the floor like Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction, ready to run around and take on the world again. I wish that a single Tylenol did that for me. Maybe I just need to take more of them.

The other amazing (and by amazing, I mean pretty horrible) thing you witness is when your child throws up the first time. Another milestone! But this one you won’t want to document. You’ll want to forget it ever happened, but like a scene from American Horror Story, it’s etched into your brain and you’re unable to banish it.

The horror and shock that comes over a kid when they get sick for the first time looks like it is powerful enough to break their brain. They’re just so . . . surprised by the whole thing.

What is this? their pale, desperate faces seem to be saying. This is possible? Why didn’t anybody warn me about this? I will kill you for allowing this to happen. Oh, look, a squirrel.

Of course, there was one good thing about getting sick this summer. (Or so I thought.) When I came down with something particularly nasty (and it hadn’t come from the kids in the first place), the wife made an executive decision to get them out of the house and away from their ailing father. Protect the children!

Sure, I was laying on the couch under a blanket wishing that I was dead, but at the same time, I suddenly found myself experiencing something I’d almost forgotten existed, something that I was certain had entered the realm of myth, akin to spotting a unicorn or Nessie.

Alone time.

No whining, no diapers, no tugging on my beard. No excitable 2-year-old smacking me in the face. No Nick Jr. or Disney Jr. or insistent pleas to run myself ragged playing our 1,273^rd game of tag. The chance to put on an R-rated movie in the middle of the day. Which I promptly did.

And then I noticed something. Or rather, heard something. There was a strange sound that I couldn’t quite place. Something spooky. Eerie.

It was quiet. The house empty. I was alone. And then something even stranger happened. I realized I missed them. I missed them.

Really? I thought. Really?

Little jerkstores. Be glad to be rid of them, don’t count the minutes until they return. But that’s what happened. I’m stuck with these people. And yes, they make me crazy. But I can’t imagine a single day without them. And when they’re not there, I feel kind of lost. Aimless. 

And then of course they’re back and the whole vicious cycle starts all over again and I find myself hoping, wishing again for some kind of terrible illness, the enduring of which seems worth the brief respite of peace and quiet it will afford me. Because I’m a terrible parent. Or maybe just a parent.

I’m going to go with the latter. 

When I Grow Up

Not long ago, just before the school year began, the Doozer and I were out in the yard, playing around, when he stopped and asked, “What did you want to be when you grew up?”

At first, it seemed like it was out of the blue. But it was clearly something that had been on his mind, something he’d earlier discussed with his mother. And his question was innocuous enough. Just curious, not cutting. But still. It could easily be interpreted as, This isn’t what you really wanted, is it? You have to have had other ideas.

Tell me you had other ideas.

I thought for a moment about how to answer. I mean, here’s the thing. I used to have hopes, dreams, ambitions, aspirations. Now I look forward to a day when I don’t have to wipe another person’s bum.

So I told him my dream. About being a writer. And then something occurred to me, which I hadn’t necessarily thought of before, or thought of in these terms.

I’ll tell you a secret, I added. Your mom and I. We’re not really grown up. Not yet.

He didn’t entirely understand. Gave me a quizzical expression. For his experience of the world, the wife and I are as old as the moon. How could we not be grown up? He said as much.

I tried to explain. Life is a process. Ongoing. Things change every day. People change every day.

More quizzical looks. And then a plea to play tag. Our entire conversation forgotten.

But still, that conversation got me thinking. What kind of parent would I be if I didn’t dream? If I didn’t have desires or ambitions or crazy hopes? How do I inspire him and his brother to have dreams, if I don’t at least try to demonstrate what it looks like to dream?

On the first day of first grade, just like on the first day of Kindergarten, he told us he wanted to be a Lego designer when he grew up. I’m thinking if you take a gander at your Facebook news feed and check out the signs other kids held up on the first day of school, you would not see this one. Firefighter, maybe. Or cowboy. Princess. But not this.

His obsession with Legos has led him to the Lego website, where he spends a lot of time watching videos and looking at images of sets he would like to own. But his favorite part is the videos where the designers discuss their process and show off all the details of their sets.

He’s interested in a process, not just a thing. That spark needs to be nurtured. Of course, will Lego designer even be a job when he grows up? I don’t know. And he’s 6, so obviously he might change his mind. He will probably change his mind. But this seems like an important part of being their dad. To encourage them to dream. To reach for the stars. And think big. Maybe that’s my whole job, actually.

Apart from that whole stupid wiping bums thing. God, I hate that part. 

What Happened on My Summer Vacation

I am not a man. I mean, based on conventional meanings. 

As far as I understand them.

Being the father of two boys has cast a bright light on my masculine shortcomings, my deficiencies in all things male, at least in any traditional sense. This thought (which I have often) returned to me when we were on vacation last month and it suddenly became my job to build a campfire. And I realized I had never built one before. By some miracle, I managed to do it.

Also, I chased a bat out of the kitchen, as well. Yeah, that happened. Although I’m still not convinced these things make me a man. (Subject for another time perhaps.)

You could trace this back to my own childhood. After our first son was born, old toys started to be excavated from our childhood basements. And our relationship, outlooks, personalities, etc., can be pretty well summed up by the fact that as a child, my wife played with a Fisher-Price camping set, while I had a Holiday Inn playset (which is apparently a thing they used to make).

I’m all for the outdoors. Through the windows of a passing car perhaps. Or from the balcony of a nice hotel room with room service and premium cable channels. But we have boys and they like to be outside. No matter how many books or movies we I push on them, the siren call of grass and sand and dirt and water is simply too much to resist.

Of course, they didn’t notice any scenery outside the car window. Someone loaned us portable DVD players to keep them entertained on the long drive. The psychological impact of this, how quickly they became acclimated to this set-up, was astonishing to behold. Our older son has spent six years in a car never once seeing a TV. But now he and his brother don’t understand why TV isn’t on in the car all the time. It changed their entire outlook on the world. If TV is in cars, imagine all the other limitless possibilities of the universe.

Or more aptly, what other awesome things are our parents keeping us in the dark about? Nothing. We swear.

Go to bed.

I find that vacation can be a lot like it was for the Griswolds. Stretches of fury and frustration punctuated by moments of beauty and harmony. Such as watching your kids splash in a lake or get melted marshmallow all over their face. Their expressions as they watch horses clop down the street or giant container ships pass before them.

Or like when your 2-year-old invents a new way to eat an ice cream cone. Just when your cynical mind thought it had seen everything in life, your kid starts eating ice cream bottom up, cone first. Now, if you have even a passing familiarity with how an ice cream cone functions, you’ll know instantly that this is not an effective strategy and there’s a reason people don’t eat them this way.

Of course, try being logical and explaining this all to a 2-year-old. They look at you with those f-off eyes like you’re the world’s biggest idiot.

Ahh, it’s good to be a dad.

Watching them on vacation frequently took me back to my own childhood vacations. Not that I remember them all that clearly, but I’ve seen photos. Actually, slides. (“It’s not called the Wheel, it’s called the carousel.”) Entire vacations would be documented, minute by minute, to replay ad nauseum for disinterested relatives and neighbors. This practice has of course been distilled now as we try to find that one perfect moment, that one all-encompassing shot to post on Facebook that will make our life look fabulous and make us the envy of all our friends and acquaintances.

Someday, will our kids go through old Facebook posts to remind them of times gone by? Will there even be an Instagram? Will the images jog their memories and be pleasing to recall? Can one image really conjure up all the magic of a childhood journey to a new, exciting place?

If we did our job right, and didn’t go all Clark Griswold and punch an animatronic moose in the snout, maybe they will just remember. I know that I will. I’ll remember all those moments, the ones not recorded for posterity or shared with the world via the Internets. Small, quiet moments that exist now only in my memory. Like the moment where – no, on second thought, never mind.

That one’s just for me.

Summer Hiatus

I heard recently that the stories of my adventure in fatherhood had been missed. And I found that heartening. (Okay, so one person mentioned to my wife that I hadn’t posted in a while, I’m not comparing myself to George R.R. Martin.) And it’s true. I haven’t written in a while. It’s not because my kids have not been entertaining or amusing, that there hasn’t been anything to write about. But I’ve been busy. Preoccupied.

With making time stop.

Spoiler alert: So far, despite Herculean efforts, I am not succeeding. Now, why would somebody want to do such a thing? Okay, so it’s not that big a mystery. Most people want the same thing. For time to slow down. But what was the impetus in my case?

The Doozer finished Kindergarten.

It was a month ago now. More. I mean, he’s officially a first grader. And I can’t handle it. I don’t know what to do with a first grader. I can remember what it was like to be one myself! I’m not ready to have one in my house. What do I do with a first grader?

But the world doesn’t care about that. It’s indifferent to my suffering. I can catch up or not, it’s going to keep turning. And time is going to continue to march forward.

I just want this moment to last forever.

And this one.

And this one. (Bubbles!)

I am afraid that fatherhood has made my heart fragile. The Doozer got a medal at the end of his soccer season. And there were tears. Little Brother brushed his own teeth. More tears. I think I might be too sensitive to be a parent. It seems difficult to believe our parents’ generation was like this. And definitely not their parents’ generation.

I don’t want them to grow up because I worry about the future. Their future. College, jobs, the world itself. Will it even be here? Have we doomed them simply by bringing them into the world? I don’t think I used to think this way. Why do I now?

I can’t see Boyhood. I mean, I really want to see Boyhood. I’m going to see it. But I know full well I will bawl my eyes out the entire time.

So I want to hold onto every moment from this summer and live in each of them just a bit longer. Little Brother’s ridiculous excitement over seeing his first fireworks. (Or just being up past his usual bedtime.) Eating dinner on the patio and flipping out about planes flying overhead, like he’s Tattoo awaiting the guests at Fantasy Island. The two of them talking to Siri, saying things like “Hamburger” and “Monster” just to see what she’ll do.

And giggling. My god, the giggling. The pure, unadulterated joy of it. And hearing a 2-year-old demand to hear Foo Fighters when riding in the car. Dancing like a maniac to Jack White’s Lazaretto. Thrilling at the sight of fireflies from the upstairs window at bedtime. Saying good night to trees. Trees. Pretending the kiddie pool is a dunk tank and falling backward into it. Again, with great peals of laughter.

The giggling. If it could just go on forever.

Okay. I have to stop. I can hardly see through the tears as I sift through these memories. I told you, fragile heart. And complete inability to stop time. So I will try to capture these moments and hold them. Like fireflies in a jar. Let them stand still. For a moment. Forever.

God, parenting really sucks.

Kicking and Screaming

The Doozer had his first soccer game. So far, Pelé, he ain’t.

Also, they played their first game after only two practices. What does anybody expect out of this operation? Of course, they did manage to win. 2-0. Yes, after approximately 50 minutes of mass chaos, the Doozer’s team emerged victorious with their first shutout.

Not that our son had anything to do with it.

Sure, he was rotated through different positions. He played defense, midfield, and forward, where he even got to kick off the ball at the center. And then he just watched it go, while every single other kid on the field chased after it. And he turned and waved at his family.

He didn’t so much run up and down the field like the others, as much as skip. And watch the ball as it rolled around. And right past him.

Multiple times.

As I watched this all unfold (in between tag-teaming Little Brother and chasing him down across vast green fields), something strange happened. I started to feel self-conscious. On the Doozer’s behalf. Which is weird, because he certainly wasn’t feeling that way. He was having a blast.

But suddenly, the world was split into jocks and nerds all over again. I started to worry what the other kids, the other parents, the coach would think about our son.

“Is our kid the team space cadet?” I asked my wife.

She rolled her eyes (as she is wont to do). “He’s having fun.”

And she was right. He was. But still. I worried. I want the whole world to love and adore my kid as I do. I don’t want him to be laughed at or dismissed or judged. Now or ever. It dawned on me that I never really figured out how to be a real grown-up before I went and did something really grown-up like have kids. Probably should’ve worked on that.

There’s nothing I want more than to teach my kids how to be confident. And self-assured. Be true to themselves. And let their freak flag fly. But how do you do that when you struggle with it yourself?

As I continued to watch, I began to think, What does this matter? This ridiculous soccer game being played by maniac children. It doesn’t matter. Right? In the grand scheme of things, in light of everything going on in the world, in this crazy, mixed-up universe, what does this matter? And how my kid chooses to play—or not play, as it were—in said game. Sure, it’d be nice if he was the next David Beckham and strangers came up to me to applaud his otherworldly performance. But he’s not. So what? Who cares? 

Why am I still thinking about this? Days later. What is wrong with me?

At the next practice, when the coach was assigning positions, he asked the Doozer where he wanted to play.

“Defense!” the Doozer replied, with surprising enthusiasm.

“Okay, go,” the coach told him.

And with that the Doozer ran—or possibly skipped—downfield toward his position. But then suddenly, he stopped. And turned to me.

“Dad, what’s defense?”

It was the best moment of my week. Or maybe of my life. I mean, I created that delightful little human being. And he is perfect as he is.

I was wrong about everything. Suck at soccer all you want. And please don’t ever change.