Conversation with my Daughter

Daughter: Dad, what do Boy Scouts do?

Me: Discriminate against homosexuals and athiests?

Daughter: No, what do they do in the woods?

Me: I think they pretty much descriminate everywhere.

Daughter: I'm hungry.

Me: Hungry for Equality? Me too, Daughter. Me too. *staring meaningfully into the distance while my Daughter picks her nose*

The color of embers in a dying winter fire

I went to a birthday party with my kids this past weekend. It was at a place called “Bounce U” which is basically just a few huge rooms with giant inflatable slides and bouncy things. Oh, and screeching kids. It has that too. It also has snot and crying kids. And pizza. One of the workers there was a 20 year old girl with a “smartphone” and a giant head.

‘Was the head inflatable?’ he asked knowingly.

Alas, no.

‘How smart was the phone?’ he asked indifferently.

Not smart enough to know it was being operated by a human pumpkin.

Her head was orange. I mean basketball orange. Gorgeous Hawaiian sunset orange. Apparently the tanning phenomenon has spread to the point where fake tans don’t even actually have to be the color tan; or even in the brown family.

“I went to Aruba for a week. I got such an awesome Orange! I mean, I think I was the orange-est one on the whole beach!”

She looked annoyed to be in the same state as these frolicking youngsters, much less in the same room as a 20 foot tall rubber slide that continually spewed out rolling toddlers who were either terrified or laughing or both at the same time. I can only imagine the text messages she was forcibly sending into the atmosphere with her tangerine speed-thumbs:

“OMG. This kid just bounced on his head! LOL! I’m a pumpkin-headed buffoon!”

“I’m totally texting at work! Someone just tried to stick a carving knife into my head and cut a toothy grin into it! OMFG!”

“LOL. My boss is such a jerk. I’m so over this place. I just had to extract myself from a basketball hoop because someone mistakenly shot a three pointer with my face.”

And so forth.

She was also, strangely enough, dressed like an Indian princess. She had the required “Bounce U” t-shirt on, but otherwise she had on furry moccasin-like boots and in general looked like a Cherokee. I moved a safe distance away and yelled “Hey Pumpkin-hontas!” to see if she would react. She didn’t (unless you count moving your thumbs over a blackberry keypad and eye-rolling dramatically as reacting).

She was orange.

Anyway, my kids had a good time bouncing around. The name of the place suggested that it was a place of higher learning, but there were no diplomas or graduation ceremonies. Maybe we’ll get one in the mail. I would like our diploma hand delivered by “Tangerine Dream” so I can tell her what a horrible Halloween decoration she is. Then I’ll make her wait in the garden for rabbits to dig her up and eat her.

She was orange.

Kids say the darndest Russian things

I haven’t written about my kids in a while, so let’s remedy that. I have three year old twins. One boy, one girl. Or two gender non-specific demons, whichever way you want to count. My daughter has lately taken to saying things like “I don’t like your voice!” and then frowning at me very dramatically; usually when I’m asking her to do something she doesn’t want to do. The odd part about this is the fact that she pronounces “voice” like “woice”, similar to how Russian spies said things in the 50’s.

“Tell me where the nuclear wessel is, or I will be wery wery angry!”

What if she is part Russian? What if she is a spy? That would make a lot of things make sense. Like all the times I see her peeking around corners and then run away quickly when she notices that I see her. Or that one time that I found her fast asleep on a set of blueprints that were quite clearly the main chamber of the United Nations. Or the other time that I caught her holding a cell phone and whispering into it. I asked her who she was talking to, and she said “Grandma”. Now, I’m not so sure.

My son, on the other hand, laughs all the time very loud and exaggeratedly. He doesn’t speak with a Russian accent, but he does dance a lot. I mean, all the time. I catch him spinning down hallways all the time with his hands in the air. One time I told him dinner was ready, and he threw a piece of cardboard on the floor and spun on his head. He ended in an elaborate pose and said “Dinner’s wiggity-wack, Dad. So are you.” Then he did the worm all the way down the hallway.

My kids are little darlings: A Russian spy and a Break dancing insane asylum escapee.

One with a lot of hair, one not so much.

One likes to kick, one likes to punch (the target is my balls in both cases).

One likes to draw, one likes to build things with blocks, one likes to drink beer (all three are me).

One likes to sing, one likes to read, both like to scream “I DON’T LIKE YOUR VOICE!” in public.

I’m going to produce a movie about them. The working title is “Target: Balls -- Electric Boogaloo” Here is the synopsis:

“A Russian spy and a Break Dancing screamer on a fun filled romp across Europe. Featuring the music of Rogers and Hammerstein, with fight choreography by Jean Claude Van Damme”

Are you telling me you aren’t already digging around for money to go see this movie? Exactly.

A Moment with my Children

It was a quiet Sunday morning. I was sitting at the breakfast table with my son and my daughter; all of us eating breakfast together. My children are two and a half years old and talking more and more every day. They were chit-chatting about what they were eating, the fact that it was sunny outside, they spotted a deer on the lawn and got excited and started yelling about animals. But then, things took a strange turn. My son turned to me and said

“The laughter of a child is life’s most precious gift.”

I paused with my spoonful of cheerios halfway to my mouth and looked over at him. Just then, my daughter looked at me and said:

“Would that I could catch a butterfly in my hand and learn its beauty. And thus be fulfilled for all eternity.”

I started looking for hidden cameras or cleverly concealed microphones but found none. I said to them both, “What did you just say?”

“I see a deer!” my son exclaimed followed by my daughter saying “I like cheerios!”

“No no no, before that. What did you say before?” I asked but was met with confused looks.

I finished my breakfast quickly and went to the sink to clean up while my kids finished their breakfast. Then, from behind me, I heard a note-perfect rendition of “America the Beautiful” in two part harmony. I ran over to the table just as it stopped. “What was that?”

“I pooped!”

“You were singing! Where did you learn that?”

“I going to school later!”

I frowned at them both and we ended up having a two minute stare down with my kids smiling and me frowning in confusion. Finally I cracked and started cleaning up the dishes. The kids jumped down from their chairs and ran into the other room to play. I finished cleaning and walked in to the other room. My son was sitting on the floor with various tools and a transistor radio opened with all of its parts scattered around the floor. He was in the process of re-wiring the main circuit board with a very precise set of pliers. My daughter was sitting in the recliner wearing a pair of reading glasses with an open copy of “Crime and Punishment” in her lap. She was on page 543. At this point, my mind broke.

“How old are you? How old are you really?!?”

“I two daddy!”

“How old are you?!?!?”

“I two daddy! I two daddy!” followed by laughter.

At this point I ran for the phone and called my wife at work. She was not at her desk, so I left a voicemail:

“Honey, the kids are older than 2. They have to be! They sang two part harmony and quoted stuff and now they are fixing the radio and reading Crime and Punishment with the tiniest set of reading glasses I’ve ever seen. I think they know I know! I need help! Where did the toolset come from? How did she hide the glasses?”

This voicemail was the final piece of evidence used against me when I was committed to a nuthouse. The kids visit me with their Mom and bring me elaborate hand-made Christmas ornaments and delicate wood carvings. My wife says they were bought at a store. I know better.

A Moment with my Son

One day, I was sitting on the nursery floor with my two year old son. We were rolling a ball back and forth and generally having a great time. Then, he suddenly stopped and threw the ball down the hallway looking highly agitated. I looked down the hallway to see where the ball went. While I was distracted he leapt at me and sprayed a cold mist into my face from a spray can that I had not previously noticed causing me to black out.

When I came to, I was looking up into a bright light. The light was then blocked by the faces of my son and my daughter, who were looking down at me. I sat up as they started circling me with their hands crossed behind their backs and disapproving looks on their faces. My son spoke with a British accent which was curious as we are from New Jersey.

“Father, we shan’t be attending dinner with you and Mummy any more.” My daughter nodded in agreement.

“Um, OK,” I began, still trying to assess my surroundings and get my bearings.

“Furthermore, my sister and I shall be heading out for a bit. We wish to tour the countryside and cavort with the wildlife!”

“The wildlife?” I still felt groggy and tried to clear my head as quickly as possible. As my vision improved, I looked around and realized I was in a jail cell. The cell door was open and my daughter dangled the keys in her left hand held behind her back as she and my son slowly paced.

“Yes Father, the wildlife and the foliage! Oh what a journey it shall be! You shall not interfere. We will leave a note with the authorities that will allow them to find you and release you in 3 days time. By then, we shall be well on our way.”

“I don’t think this is a good idea,” I said to both of them, causing my daughter to frown even more and take a threatening step toward me. “What you think is irrelevant, Father,” she said as she resumed her pacing.

My son continued, “We shall frolic in the countryside and eat strawberries and pick daisies and dance and sing all day! We do need some information from you, however,” my son said as he stopped in front of me.

“Information?”

“Yes. Your vehicle. The silver one. The one that Mummy drives to her place of business.”

“What about it?”

“How does it work?” My son stepped closer with a hopeful gleam in his eye. “The pedals. I’ve seen them. What do they do? How does the car move forward? Does it have something to do with the pedals? You appear to do nothing but there must be some way for your vehicle to propel itself. Tell me! I must know!”

Realizing I now held a bargaining chip, I leaned back against the wall. “And what if I don’t tell you?”

“You will tell us, Father,” my son said as he glanced over at my daughter. “You must tell us.”

“This has gone on long enough!” I yelled as I stood up. “You are both two years old! I don’t know how you suddenly learned to talk so well, or why you both have British accents, but I have had enough! Wait until your Mother gets home, she will not be amused! No Nemo for you tonight! No Little Mermaid either!”

My son took in this rant with a sly grin as my daughter stifled a laugh. “Oh Father, don’t you know that we hold all the cards here? You will give us the information we require, and we shall begin our journey by nightfall. We shall roam the highways—“ Just then, my son stopped in mid-sentence and made an uncomfortable face. “Oh, dear. I have just defecated.”

“What is going ON here?!?” My confusion and frustration had reached their limits as my son and daughter had a concerned conversation about what to do.

Suddenly, my daughter produced an aerosol can and sprayed a cold mist into my face. My son shouted “NO! NOT YET! WHAT DO THE PEDALS DO? WHAT DO THE PEDALS DO DAMN YOU!?!?!” at me as I gradually lost consciousness.

I awoke on the floor of the nursery. It was dark with only the glow of the night light in the room. Thinking I must have fallen asleep and had a very strange dream, I got up and noticed that both my son and daughter were asleep in their cribs. I looked around for a spray can and found nothing. I looked in my son’s crib and noticed he was clutching a set of car keys. My wife’s keys. In my daughter’s crib, I found another set of keys that looked just like the jail cell keys from my dream.

I decided right then and there that my kids would never learn to drive. I also immediately called my cable company and cancelled the BBC channel and any other channel that featured British accents. It was all I could do to keep from screaming. I slowly crept out of the room and down the hallway. From my children’s room, I heard my son’s voice say “’Ello guvnor!” followed by tiny laughter. I wrote a quick note to my wife and fled the house without packing a thing. I am currently in a safe house on the US/Canadian border. Tell my wife I love her.

They are smarter than either of us ever realized.

Nursery Rhymes

I feel that I’ve had enough experience reading nursery rhymes lately that I can write my own book for the kids of today. Here are some of the nursery rhymes I have come up with so far for today’s modern little lady and gentleman:

Here comes Charlie
Walkin’ down the street!
Smack-a-doodle, Smack-a-doodle
Charlie just sheet!

Mary, Mary what a scary
Way you blink your eyes and stare-y
At my bulging belly here
Don’t you know it’s full of beer?

Isn’t this a lovely tree?
Full of rabbits looking at me!
One is blue, the others pink,
The blue one smiles and drops a wink!
He knows the truth behind the lies,
The pink rabbits are gay.

Tippity Tappity Over the Bridge
Rippity Rappity here come the kids!
Bippity Bappity running along
Sippity Sappity singing a song!
Lippity Lappity what a big dog!
Mippity Mappity dragging a log!
Flippity Flappity what do I see?
Whippity Whappity the log is made of dog crap.

Pencil Peacock Peaches Pie
Don’t make Santa start to cry!
If you do, he’ll make a list
And mark your name with a deadly fist!
Then he’ll open both his eyes,
And turn his tears into fireflies!
Each one jetting for the coast
To the house of the boy they hate the most!
Once they find you then you’ll see
Just how vengeful Santa can be!
*this nursery rhyme should be accompanied by the sounds of thunder and lightning and deep ominous laughter…for the kiddies’ enhanced enjoyment!*

Turn your eyes toward yonder bear!
What a hat he tries to wear!
He bought it at the corner store,
And now he wants one hundred more!
Maybe I will help him out
With 50 cents I just took out
Oops, the bear just bit my hand
Then tipped his hat and ate my intestines...man.

Blueberries three
Baked in a muffin
Strawberries two
Ate them, now there’s nothin’
Blackberry one
Can’t remember where I stuck it
Raspberries Zero
Those are my favorite! Awww...something something! (NOTE: Finish this later)

Wizzle wuzzle wazzle woo
Twenty five birds just crapped on my shoe
One left a feather perched upon my head
Twenty five birds will soon be dead.

Johnny Joe just tried to fly
With wings of paper very wide
He landed on a cotton ball
And broke his ass

Mister Murphy water and wine
Kissed a mule and made him cry
Now he rides alone at night
With court ordered therapy and pumpkin pie?

Sally ran down to catch a ride.
Sally fell down, Oh My!
She opened her eyes and noticed a duck.
Duck off.

Cheeky chucky chooky do
Choky chacky...

Ah, forget it.

Three Ring Circus

Come one come all, gather around! Come witness the Three Ring Circus! You know what I’m talking about. Get a group of parents and their kids together in a big room, or a huge social gathering. Birthday parties are prime-time real estate for a Three Ring Circus. The doors close, the lights dim and almost immediately, the show begins. Poor unsuspecting toddlers are commanded to start dancing, and dance they will! *cue circus music*:

“Where’s Mommy?!?”
“What does a puppy say?!?”
“Hug your sister!”
“Run in a circle!!!”
“Who’s got a belly button?!?”
“Buy drugs for Uncle Larry!”

The poor tots might as well be paraded around in a circle, with fancy hats and flashy clothes and rubber balls balanced on their noses or be made to walk backwards in awkward high steps. I’m not excluding myself from this behavior. “Judge not, lest ye be gathering moss” is an old family motto we live by. We’re all guilty, in one way or another. I once saw a mother throwing firecrackers at her two and a half year old son’s feet screaming “Dance midget! DANCE! *crack!* What does a DUCK SAY! *crack!* Where is your EYELID!?!? *crack-crack-crack* Touch your EPIDERMIS!!! *crack-sob*”

I mean, who do these parents think they are? Do they think it’s ok to hook up a wagon to their daughter’s back and make her pull a wagon all they way to Reno, Nevada?!?! (That never happened). I don’t think it is very developmentally healthy to take your 8 month old son’s hand and just smack it every time he gets the letters mixed up in the Greek Alphabet! (Doesn’t happen). Let them live their dream filled little lives, ringmasters! Stop putting your children on stage and making them act out Act 10, Scene 6 of Hamlet while wearing uncomfortable tights! (No such thing as Act 10 scene 6 in Hamlet, and none of this happens anyway).

If I seem a little sensitive on this subject, it is because it strikes close to my heart. I don’t talk about this often, but it can all come out now: My parents, bless their dark opportunistic hearts, made me dress up like Ronald McDonald when I was four and go door to door trying to sell French Fries to our neighbors. (Oh, come on…) I also had to sing a little jingle and do a brief tap dance. (No and no) I still remember the haunting strains of that sorcerer’s tune (what sorcerer?!?):

Hey buddy, what’s your name!
I bet you are hungry today!
Get in line and don’t be shy!
Have yourself some McDonald’s Fries!

McDonalds! McDonalds!
The Hamburglar will take your life!
McDonalds! McDonalds!
Mayor McCheese will steal your wife!
McDonalds! McDonalds!
I heard somewhere the Fry Guys are GAY!
McDonalds! McDonalds!
Just what is Grimace anyway?!?

It hurts my heart and soul to remember those days. Sweat running down my white and red painted face as I moved my floppy-shoed feet as fast as I could while singing that terrible song. Oh don’t get me wrong, I sold my fair share of fries. I was a pro, even then. I digress. Parents, let your children be children. Don’t make them your own personal performing Muppet Seal Babies! (What is a Muppet Seal? I have to call that headhunter and look into getting a new job…)

(The part of the author’s subconscious was played today by Parentheses.)

Juswaytil

Indian fire god? No. Demon lord? Maybe. French delicacy? Hardly. The “juswaytil tribe” is a group of disgruntled parents (often ones with more than one child) who prey on new parents with soul-dampening proclamations meant to diminish any fleeting optimism they may have at any given moment. “Ojuswaytil” is their cry; an admonition from a truly lost group of souls. Ojuswaytil is a word that forms the beginning of a dreaded sentence. They haunt optimistic parents with sentences like these:

New unassuming parent: “Little Timmy got sick yesterday, I was up all night!”
Old, grizzled veteran parent of 5: “Ojuswaytil Little Timmy rears back and throws up directly into your goddamned ears 10 times a day for an entire year…”

New baby-faced innocent parent: “Little Suzie fell and skinned her knee at daycare! Oh, how she cried!”
Grouchy, war-torn parent of 4: “Ojuswaytil Little Suzie runs into a moving fan belt running at 200 miles per hour while her brother shoots rockets at her!”

New, timid, doe-eyed little parent: “Poor little Jackie boy cut his first tooth the other day. He was crying all night!”
Been-around-the-block parent: “Ojuswaytil Jackie runs head first into a time machine and all of his precious little new teeth come flying back at you from 1934!”

Do any of these things happen? I would think not; and that is the real problem here. For some reason, unsuspecting new parents get bombarded by killjoy experienced parents at every turn. The dreaded “Ojuswaytil” is a horrible way of saying “You may be suffering now, but you ain’t seen nothin’ yet!” What benefit does that give the poor, sleep-deprived new parent? “Hey, I’m having trouble here, do you have any examples of how completely miserable I will be in the near future? You do?!? Wow, thanks, I was hoping I could pour some more despair into my overflowing glass of darkness!” Don’t try to get involved in their bitter game of one-upmanship; the juswaytils are too experienced and wily. Just back away and admit that it must have been terrible when 4-month old Steven opened his own chest cavity and held out his still-beating heart while pooping acid and vomiting rivers of raw sewage. You will never come up with something worse. More examples:

“Ojuswaytil little Timmy reaches into his diaper and proceeds to brush your teeth with his own poop!”
“Ojuswaytil tiny Hortence roundhouse-kicks your kneecap triggering a teary night of icepacks and muffled curses thrown into the unforgiving night.”
“Ojuswaytil baby Anna renounces Christ and begins bleeding from the stigmata signs.”
“Ojuswaytil sweetie-pie Bobo slices your Achilles Tendon with a broken shard of glass from a beer bottle that he smashed over your head while wrestling over some Tinker Toys and a Tickle-Me-Bastard!”

I’ve seen this all before; trust me (and who names their kid Bobo? So many unanswered questions…). These proclamations will usually be followed by a prolonged drag off of a cigarette and a knowing grunt of laughter. Beware the entrenched parent, so buried in bitterness and baby food that they have lost the light. Their reality has been twisted into some dark version of Earth with violent little baby Gods and Goddesses terrorizing them daily. I hope they find the right path again, I really do. Just go to a baby shower sometime with your newborn and see what happens. Go on, I dare you. The baby shower is a common campground for the juswaytil tribe. It will be like running the gauntlet through a graveyard of ghostly apparitions all trying to kill their parents in some fashion. They set you up with faint praise of your cute baby, and then they hit you with the sledgehammer:

“Ojuswaytil they turn 18, then you will be down on your knees begging Satan to end your life as your teenager(s) fly around the yard with flaming pitchforks!” (Really? I should just sit here and wait 18 years for that? What should I do while I’m waiting? Look for new friends? Good idea.)

“Ojuswaytil you try to bake a cake and suddenly your 8 month old explodes out from inside the CAKE you JUST BAKED!!!”

“Ojuswaytil you get bitten by that wonderful bundle of joy who suddenly has newly grown viper’s teeth. Because that’s what happens; you know: They. Grow. The. Teeth. Of. Vipers. Beware the ides of March! Beware the Vipers of Similac! Woe is the lord of the castle, for she will be struck by venomous stings as painful as thousands of needlepoints thrown earthward from the hand of God!” *trailing off into Old English scripture and eventually burned at the stake as a heretic*

Look, this is all common knowledge. I could go on all day here. I just want you to take a moment and appreciate the friends who don’t do this to you; who don’t work you into a panic over events that haven’t even happened yet. Enjoy your time with your little one or ones. There will be plenty of time to “wait” for terrible things to happen; that is unless you are stricken by the wrath of Luther the baby-God. Juswaytil you see how awful he is…

A Moment With My Daughter

On a cold morning this past December, I walked in on my 21-month old daughter sitting on the floor of her nursery reading a book. I sat down in front of her and the following exchange took place (names have been changed to protect the innocent):

Daughter: *eyes on her book* PUP-py
Me: *looking at a book that has no puppies in it* Puppy?
Daughter: Puppy WA-wa.
Me: *eyebrows furrowed*
Daughter: *looking up at me now, more insistently* PUP-PY WA-WA!
Me: Um...
Daughter: *frowning at me*
Me: *uncertainly* Uh...Yes, puppy wa-wa...
Daughter: *still frowning*
Me: Do you want some wa-wa?
Daughter: Hi Duckie. *still frowning, then looking back at her book*
Me: *gets slowly up and backs out of the room*

I walked down the hallway to my bedroom and sat at my desk to contemplate the meaning behind this exchange. What do I know, at this moment? There is a puppy, somewhere, in need of water. In the book? In real life? Is my daughter the metaphorical “puppy” in this case? Is she thirsty? My responses to her were met with definite distaste. Am I the “puppy”? Is “wa-wa” a symbol of the thirst for knowledge? She acknowledged my presence with ‘Hi Duckie’. Is there a duck that somehow ties into this?

While I agonized over this exchange, my daughter walked down the same hallway to my room and gave me a stuffed duck, saying “Baby Duck” and then slowly walked back down the hallway to her nursery. Why a duck? Why now? Does it have something to do with the true meaning of Christmas? She is smarter than me, I know this. Was baby Jesus gifted a baby duck in his manger so long ago? Does the receipt of this duck now mean I am Jesus?!? Does my daughter represent one of the three wise men?!?!? Do Baby Ducks have any sort of symbolism in reference to the apocalypse? By accepting this “Baby Duck”, as she called it, do I acknowledge the mortality of the planet? Are we all Baby Ducks? How do the puppy and the wa-wa tie in to all of this?!?!

I crept back down the hallway and peeked into my daughter’s room. She was lying on the floor looking up at the ceiling singing what sounded like the ABC song. “A...F...HJ...MP...QR...V...WXYZ.” I hurriedly wrote down what she sang and ran back down the hallway before she knew I was spying on her. I put my scribbled notes down on my desk and sat down. I had a lot to go over here. Yes, it appeared to be the standard alphabet, but with key omissions. Why did she pick the letters she did? Where did BCD go? Why no S? Why include Q and leave out E? I took the missing letters and tried to form words out of them. The best I could come up with was “DUCK TALK BIG NOSE.” I dropped my pencil and pushed myself away from the desk. The duck again. Something is going to happen with “the duck” that much is clear. Big Nose? I looked in the mirror carefully staring at my nose from all angles. Finally, I decided that my nose must look huge to her, and then I realized that she has been talking about me all along! I AM THE DUCK! I AM THE DUCK! I fell on the floor and crawled into the corner of my office, shutting the lights off on the way.

I feel as though I may be going insane.

Epilogue

Later that night, before bed, my daughter patted me on the head and said to me “Night-Night, Duckie. Puppy wa-wa. Santa bye-bye.”

I fear I will be dead by daybreak.