ode to the pointless parenting polemic

i'm having one of those days. come to think of it, i'm always having one of those days. you know what i'm talking about--a day during which there is much arguing with short people who, for some reason, i have deluded myself into believing have some sense of logic.

example #1: driving home from this morning's field trip i had three children in my car. two were mine, one was not. (i'm a math whiz. can't you see that?!) because we had to be at the art center *at* noon i made the decision to let the kids eat in the car on the way back. against my own suggestion to the parents that they not pack yogurt in their children's lunches, i packed some for the boy. most of the time the boy will drink two drinkable yogurts without batting an eye. today, for some reason, he only drank half of the one i packed. and come on, let's all be frank here, the reason was simply that we were in the car and i had a desire not to have yogurt spilled everywhere. so, after he drank half he said, "mom, what should i do with this?" and held up the half full yogurt container.

"does it have yogurt in it?" i asked.

"yes." he replied.

"well, then you'll have to hold onto it until we get back to school."

no answer.

...five minutes later...

"mom, my yogurt spilled."

"you were supposed to be holding it. why weren't you holding it?!"

"i don't know."

"obviously, if you put an open yogurt container down in the car while i'm driving, it's going to spill, so why did you do that?"

"i don't know."

pointless arguing because how do you even come back at "i don't know." you can't. try it sometime. when someone is yelling at you about something just say, "i don't know." and see where they go from there. nowhere, that's where they'll go. the best you'll get is some under the breath mutterings. trust me. i know.

example #2: as i was putting the girl into her car seat (which, in and of itself is a huuuuuuuuuuuge transgression. no one *puts* the girl anywhere. she does it she-self!) she picked her nose and hit serious pay dirt. a booger the size of my head came out. i reached for it (because that's how brave mothers are. we reach out and grab boogers the size of our heads *without*a*tissue* and dispose of them properly) and she SCREAMED:

"NO! NO! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! I want to eat my boogerrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!"

and i mean SCREAMED. the entire parking lot turned and looked at me and my pig-headed, booger-eating kid.

"why do you want to eat your booger? that's gross. yucky, yuck. plllllllllllbt. yuck. no, no, no."

"I WANT TO EAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT MYYYYYYYYYY BOOOOOOOOOOOO-GGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRRRR!
waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!"

and there i was, reduced once again, to under my breath mutterings--"fine. whatever. eat your fricken booger. make a booger salad. have an ice cream sundae with a booger on top. what do i care? it's *your* life. fer chrissakes."

Comments

[slouching mom]

So, so funny. I would have melted into a puddle in the parking lot.

When Ben was two, I took him to TJ Maxx. While I was in the dressing room with him (and you know their dressing rooms -- insanely long corridors with about 30 stalls), he started shouting, "F-ck!" Out of the blue! I promise that he had had not heard it from us -- my husband and I behaved ourselves as far as cursing goes until our second was born, and then we gave up.

And Ben repeated "F-ck," still shouting, about 10 times in a row. I remained frozen in the stall until every single person in the changing room had left. Which took over an hour.

[Colleen]

Delaney's really speaking a lot now and I've been so excited. Until I read your post. THAT is what I have to look forward to??? Oh, boy. :)

[MoxieMomma]

omg, i would have hidden in the stall too!!

and colleen, the boy never did anything like that--this is all new to me with this crazy she-devil. it's possible that delaney won't scream crazy things and embarrass you. anything is possible....muahahahahahahaaaaa!
:)