Reason #47 Why Tigers Eat Their Young
Now that I am watching a toddler on a regular basis, I have spotted a missed opportunity for The Dory, our local watering hole. The Dory has a pond in back of it and in the winter they float a little raft with a Christmas Tree out on the pond to everyone’s delight. Eating lunch at The Dory with a toddler is impossible unless you have duct taped the little darling to the chair. I began to wonder, what if The Dory furnished floating playpens? You could have lunch with another adult, anchor the kid out about thirty feet; close enough to monitor them, but not so close that they could swim in. Yep, an opportunity missed.
“Mom, how come you bought Daiquiri Mix and liquor? You don’t drink,” asked my daughter.
“I thought it might be better than using Xanex.”
“But you’re over fif.......”
“DON’T SAY IT! Don’t you dare say that “f” word!”
“Is it the baby? Is she too much for you?”
“What? That precious child?”
“Yes, Mom, that precious child. The one who throws your shoes in the toilet, snaps your glasses apart, crayons your TV screen, throws raw eggs on the floor, constantly strips off her clothes and diaper, runs from you and fights you when you try to catch her and get a diaper on her, pulls down curtains, throws the remote across the room, shoves jelly toast in the VCR slot, empties your handbag, plays with your car keys and loses them, insists on answering the phone and won’t let you have a turn to talk, pours cups of water on you when you bathe her, sticks her fingers in your lipstick, won’t eat anything you fix her, unless it’s on your plate, then she wants it all, yells in the background whenever I call you to see how things are, figures out cabinet locks and empties cabinets, colors your walls, floors, and windows with her Crayola’s, tears pages out of your books, colors in your magazines, screams on the other side of the bathroom door the whole time you’re in the can, flips the outdoor light switch on and off whenever its not blocked by an object she can’t move or pull down. Is it the hours of watching Sesame Street reruns on TiVO, or the way she uses all furniture as a jungle gym and insists on climbing up over the arms of everything instead of just sitting down normally, or the hours of watching The Princess and the Frog movie, or the hours of coloring on paper with her, or worrying that when she sticks the crayons in her ears that you won’t be able to get them out, is it the way she can tantrum for twenty minutes straight without drawing a breath, or the way she empties the dryer when you’re in the bathroom and throws the clothes all over, or the way she grabs for your coffee cup and fights you for it and the hot coffee spills all over you, or the way she kicks the wall for nearly an hourly when you put her to bed? Am I getting close?”
“She’s just an active, normal two year old. I can handle her.”
“Not if you’re downing dacqueri’s, Mom.”
“Sweetheart, you misunderstand. The dacqueri’s are for her..... the spawn of Satan.”
“You can’t give a baby liquor!”
“Not more than three drinks a day, I promise.”
“I know you’re just joking, Mom. You’re not going to turn yourself or her into a drunk.”
“I’m just thinking that the whole babysitting thing would be easier for both of us if one of us was plastered...just until she’s five and start’s school....what are you doing?”
“I think I need a drink now...”
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