The Perfect Family Sunday in Central Park

I awoke to the sounds of gagging, followed by the telltale body convulsions then, wait for it, wait for it…the full, hot onslaught of warm vomit trickling down my neck.  It wasn’t me who puked, I had done that earlier in the evening, this time it was TIT who doused me in a wakeup shower of warm vomit. Like all families, we believe in the share and share alike philosophy. The TIT who picked up a stomach bug on Friday, shared it with me on Saturday, but decided he wasn’t quite finished and decided to share again early Sunday morning when I brought him into bed with me. 

I had been awake most of the night with chills and stabbing stomach pains, praying that by dawn’s light, I would be healed or dead.  I was neither, but I was a mother and I have no choice but to champion this little stomach plague and fight on.  It was sunny and the expected and much needed warmth of spring was fighting to triumph over the brutal ends of winter.  I couldn’t deny my kids a beautiful day in Central Park. I too need to fight the battle of the day in front of me.

“Coffee. I need coffee,” I said to Matt as I handed him the TIT.  “He’s still sick,” I warned.  I didn’t even bother to shower, that would come later, my first mission was to try and shake this feeling and while I knew coffee was probably not the first or best thing my ailing stomach needed, I knew without it my mind wouldn’t have the strength to go forward.  I head down to the bodega below, chunks of puke on the back of my shirt and my hair smelling anything but fresh.  What did I care? Most likely the unwitting counter attendant at the bodega will assume I was out partying all night and the smell of puke was my badge of honor in a successful evening out.  Little would did they know, the smell of rancid milk and bile was merely my morning badge of motherhood.

By 10:30am, 5 hours after my day started, we were outside in Central Park.  I was praying that both my stomach and TIT’s would stay strong. The Commander wanted to go rock climbing, an activity which sounded both dangerous and unappealing.  “I’ll take him up there,” Matt says as we approached the enormous rock formation that rose upwards towards the pale blue sky like the glistening skyscrapers behind it. I stood below with my father-in-law and TIT as the Commander and my husband hiked up to the top.  If my stomach wasn’t already being torn apart by this foreign mutant virus, than it would be reeling from watching my four year old standing 30 feet up on top of a slippery rock screaming “Cowabunga” as he slid down the face of the giant rock formation.  “Are you fucking crazy?” I ask my husband who assures me that his is perfectly safe as he points out the other asinine morons who are doing the same thing.  “Just because someone jumped off a bridge, would you do it?’ I was about to ask him that question, but I was afraid his answer would be, ‘yes’.

So how do you get an adrenaline junkie four year old away from the very thing that he lives for? Bribery!

“You want an ice cream?” I scream, as he stands poised on top of the rock ready to slide down again. “No, not now. Maybe later,” he hollers down to me. I try one better. “You want to go to FAO Schwarz and get some Angry Bird things?” I shout up to him.  My husband is no help at this point. He is just as eager as my four year old to catapult his body down the face of the rock.  The Commander thinks about my latest offer and weighs the proposition in his mind.  “Okay, when I am done playing on this.” At this point, TIT is unsettled in his stroller.  He is in, he is out, he is crying, he wants to be carried, he wants to be put down, he wants to be picked up all within a span of 45 seconds. I decide he looks thirsty and I give him the water bottle. I want him to stay hydrated, that’s important since he definitely has to be dehydrated from throwing up.  He seems grateful at first and takes a big gulp and then proceeds to dump the water right on his lap.  He looks shocked when the cold water hits, but I don’t understand why he would be shocked since he does this all the time, nor do I understand why I continually give him these water bottles when I know exactly what’s going to happen. So I blot him dry while the Commander comes charging down the rock with my husband behind him.

Enough.

Central Park is one of those places that keeps you trapped, making it nearly impossible in this dizzying world of trees and paths that loop around hills and valleys, to find your way out to the correct side.  “That way?” I point.  I think over the hill, over yonder is the east side.  I try to use Trump Tower as my beacon and head towards it, but just as we are pushing the double stroller up the enormous hill, TIT spots an enormous Big Bird. Not a BIG bird, like a mutant pigeon on steroids or fat on Dylan’s Candy Bar treats, but the real deal straight off the set of Sesame Street.  He points and the Commander who hasn’t watched Sesame Street since in diapers, charges towards the bird. “Hey Big Bird, hey, hey! You wanna come with me to FAO Schwarz,” the Commander is trying to attach this creature to the rest of our day’s activities.  As we approach the bird, he is not just any Big Bird; he’s carrying a box with other Sesame Street character puppets that he makes come to life as the Commander approaches. Dancing in the box, the creepy red creature “Elmo” which is like kiddie crack to anyone in Huggies pops his head up and TIT is grinning from ear to ear.  I am happy to see TIT so happy since really hasn’t smiled since he started barfing on Friday.  Not only does Big Bird have a stash of puppet friends in the box, he also has a big ole sign, smack on his stomach: $5 per picture.  Really? Really? $5. You need to be that specific? It would kill you to smile for .06 seconds for a mere $2 or however many one dollar bills I can gather? But you put this heavy price on it and I feel insulted and kinda raped.

Big Bird motions towards his sign as the Commander and TIT try to engage him in play.  He’s pointing and silently motioning to us to shove cash in his box while shuffling his feet in dance steps for the laughing Commander. And I am kinda pissed off at this Sesame Street stripper scam Big Bird is running here. I am not paying up.  Now maybe if Big Bird would negotiate his fee down, I’d play, but I feel strongly on principle here that this kind of prostitution should be cracked down on the same way Giuliani took out the Times Square kind.  So I wave off Big Bird and get the Commander and TIT moving fast towards the east when we stumble upon another kid crack magnet.

A man is standing guarding the entrance to the tunnel blowing the biggest bubbles I have ever seen.  We are talking 10-foot long snake bubbles that sail effortlessly 50 feet across the park. Every kid is pinned to this man, their eyes wide with excitement and wonder as they watch him use an enormous wand dipping it into a bucket of frothy suds.  He has attracted a growing crowd of adults and kids alike who are mesmerized by the sight.  “Amazing pictures! That’s gorgeous! Look at that one,” the man, says inciting his spectators to take photos and chase the bubbles.  The Commander is off dancing in a shower of bubbles with glee.  “You have any ones?” I ask Matt, as now TIT wants in on the bubble action.  He pulls out some crinkled dollar bills from his jacket pocket and we toss it into the jar.  Unlike Big Bird, there was no minimum or upcharge for the kiddie champagne room and I wasn’t looking for extras.  I am all for a reasonable charge for park entertainment that gives me a few minutes of quiet and keeps TIT and the Commander smiling.  A few dollars well spent, I think as I collect my kids and start heading east again. 

By this point, the Commander is deciding what he wants to buy at FAO Schwarz.  “Is it like Target?” he asks me. “Better,” I promise assuaging his concern that this is like when mommy called Dollar Tree the “Green Target” which has scarred my son for life.  Before we are able to make it out of the park, the Commander spots a hot dog cart. TIT is leading the charge pointing and wailing, “Eh, eh, eh” as we make our approach.  “I want a hot dog,” the Commander screams.  “And I want an apple juice.” And while the Commander is eating his hot dog, top down horizontally, we are still trying to decipher what “Eh” means.  “We CANNOT give him a hot dog,” I say to my husband.  “He will seriously shit all over the park.” The TIT is now frantically trying to tell us something but I am not sure what. “Eh, eh, eh.” So we point, “Do you want water?” He shakes his head no. “Do you want a pretzel?” He shakes his head no.  I read down the list on the side of the cart to which TIT responds to everything with no. So $15 later, we give him a soft pretzel, a juice and some chips and he wails. 

We were unable to read this list fast enough to distract the Commander from the ice cream man standing feet from the pretzel man.  “I want an ice cream. You promised. You said I could have one.” He tosses the remnants of the hot dog on the ground and beelines to the ice cream cart.  Of course he remembers the bribe. He can’t remember how to wipe his own ass or what he did at school on Wednesday, but the promise of an ice cream is not forgotten.  So Matt buys the Commander the lemon-lime dots but not before TIT has figured out what “Eh” means.  Now TIT is pointing and frantically gesturing to the ice pops that I think is a good because it seems like it would be okay for a bad tummy.  I unwrap the popsicle and he is happy for a minute, satisfied as his face turns a mixture of red and blue from the dyes in the rocket pop. 

We have a good distance to walk to get to FAO Schwarz and I try to steer away from the plethora of vendors pedaling $18 bubble guns and pinwheels.  My goal was to get out of the park without opening my wallet again.  We succeed and make it to FAO Schwarz, which proves to be everything and more than Target to the Commander.  Satisfied with his new angry bird gift from his grandpa, the Commander is playing with his new toy when we contemplate getting food. 

We trudge north again, skirting the side of the park and trying to avoid any other street vendors.  I know saying NO and meaning it, is a part of parenting which I need to get the nerve up to be better at.  But really I am just looking to survive and a $5 junky toy to shut my kid up is way better than a stern NO and hours of hysterics.  And like manna from heaven, the ice pop has worked its magic and TIT is sound asleep in the stroller.  “We can eat,” I say. I certainly wasn’t hungry given my current gastrointestinal situation, but I could always use a cocktail.  So we find a little outdoor French café to sit and pull the stroller up to the table where TIT peacefully naps and the Commander plays with his latest Angry Bird acquisition.

 I forewarn the waiter. “We need this to be fast. We have a ticking time bomb.” I motion to TIT in the stroller.  “If he wakes up, things are going to go down hill and fast.”  I think the waiter understands, but either he is not a parent or he is French and hates Americans because we wait a painfully long time for drinks and food. Just long enough that TIT wakes just as they put the food on the table. And he wakes up angry, very angry.  He’s screaming and yelling trying to grab the Commander’s new toy which is like starting WWWIII.  Just when I thought we could enjoy a leisurely Sunday brunch with cocktails, I am clocked in the face with a sippy cup and reminded there is no such thing as brunch with toddlers. 

And because we are masochists, we don’t call it a day after brunch.  “Who wants to go to the Central Park Zoo?” I ask.  Matt rolls his eyes into the back of his head and looks longingly at oncoming traffic.  The Commander is all for it and TIT having no idea what a zoo is, seems happy that his stroller is moving again. We walk back towards Central Park and the Commander, going on adrenaline, lack of sleep and a good dose of sugar, is leading the charge excited to throw a ball to the seals and see the penguins.  But when we get to the zoo, it’s mobbed and my husband’s patience had run out back at the prostituting Big Bird.  “I can’t do it. I am not doing it. The line for tickets is an hour long,” he moans.  “Back me up here,” he says which really means he wants me to be the one to tell our primed and excited 4 year old that his dreams of playing with a seal today will be unceremoniously crushed. I oblige knowing that this will inevitable require his participation as well.  Obviously I don’t tell him the truth, that daddy may stab the polar bear to death if we have to be tortured by another crowded, expensive and annoying endeavor. “Max, we can’t go to the zoo,” I say as we are standing at the front gates for it.  The lies don’t work the way they used to, as he approaches 5 he isn’t as gullible as he once was so when Matt tells him that the zoo is closed for repairs, the Commander will have none of that bullshit.  “It’s open. See Daddy! See! It’s open. See the seals? All the people are in there.” He rushes the gate like an East German when the Berlin wall fell, entering through the exit as we give chase.  

“Do you want an ice cream?” Matt asks. It’s a pathetic and poor attempt to distract the Commander. He just had ice cream and this was going to take a lot more than an ice cream cone to tear him away.  Matt tries the offer of a strawberry float but by now the Commander was screaming and flailing and kicking on the ground.  We are the people who everyone is staring at, the people providing more entertainment than the trained clapping seal.  Matt scoops the Commander up and tries a shoulder ride to draw his attention away.  It’s a colossal failure and he just gets kicked in the face with a pair of light-up Pumas.  I giggle as we drag the Commander kicking and screaming away from the zoo. 

And like a mirage, we see a man making balloon animals.  We move towards him and we move fast. We know that this just may silence the beast.  He’s wearing a giant balloon animal hat and twisting and turning balloons into zoo creatures for the little girl in front of us.  We “oh and ah” and pretend this shit is cooler than a penguin wearing a top hat.  “Wow, holy cow Max, he can make you anything you want our of a BALLOON!!” At this point, if this guy wants to charge me $40 for a Tony the Tiger hat, I will gladly pay.  My feet were killing from walking and I was centimeters away from blowing chunks all over the park. The Commander stops crying for a minute as he watches balloon man finish his creation. The tears dry up and he says, “I want a sword. I want a green sword.”

Fine. Fine! You want a sword, great! He can make you a canon for all I care, just for the love of Christ stop fucking crying. “Can you make two?” I ask the man and motion towards TIT.  Three minutes and $3 later, the clouds had passed and I had the two happiest kids in the world as they wacked each other with balloon swords.  Both boys were both happy, at the same time. No one was crying, they were playing together and the world seemed almost perfect on this beautiful spring day in Central Park. To the other park goers we must have looked like a postcard, Matt holding the Commander on his shoulders and TIT and strutting not far behind....beaming ear to ear in synchronicity!  And then, as we were mere inches from being out of the park, both swords deflate and burst unwinding into nothing more than shredded green plastic.

And the tears begin again. This time, from both, and they lasted all the way to home.

The Morning Rush Hour(s)

It is the longest part of my day.  Each morning I awake with the false sense of strength that I believe I posses the fortitude and wherewithal to get through the next three hours until the Commander gets dropped at Preschool. I give myself a pep talk in my head. “You can do this.  It’s not that hard.  This is easy.  People have 6 kids and can get out of the house and to a job. You can do this.  You can make it through!” I feel high on life for a few minutes.  I feel like I can champion this day, that today is the day that I can get two kids dressed, fed and out the front door and to their respective activities. Quickly though, reality sinks in and by 9 am I have given in and given up.

Each morning I wake up before the sun. Each morning I wake up to a naked man in my bed. He’s 4 and he has decided to disrobe entirely before getting in bed with us somewhere in the darkest hours of the night. I usually can sleep through the Commander’s advances as he barrels into our room, strips naked and curls up on top of our pillows horizontally like a cat.  I am usually so tired, so self medicated with Tylenol PM and Shiraz that I sleep like a contortionist for the better part of the night. My husband has managed to train himself the same way and so we both sleep on 2 square inches of the bed while the Commander splays out in the rapture of pissed-stained 1000 TC designer sheets.

Before 6 am, I stumble into the kitchen hoping that the Commander will stay put in bed with daddy just long enough that I can make a cup of coffee and guzzle it down.  Obviously, I am fighting the hangover of the Shiraz and the Tylenol PM, but without those two I wouldn’t have slept at all, so I accept this is as the lesser of two evils. 

The Commander hears the clinking of the coffee cup and comes sprinting into the kitchen.  “Mommy, do you know Luke Skywalker? Mommy where is the pork side? Why are the birds good but the pigs are bad? Have you been on Glactica before?  How do I go there? Mommy, Mommy, Mommy where is my Princess Leia telepod. I want to give it to Noa.  Mommy, Mommy. Mommy. Mommy, Mommy. Mom. I am talking to you.”

My eyes aren’t fully opened and the caffeine has yet to enter my veins.  I cannot answer any of his questions.  I stand there, staring at my naked toddler looking as if I just got smacked in the face with a light saber (Which does happen for real 5 minutes later). “Max, honey, I cannot answer these questions until mommy has had a really huge, huge coffee.”

I know that he can hear me. And I know that he does actually understand what I am asking him to do, he just doesn’t give a fuck. “Mommy, if I went on the Galactica how would I get there? What do they eat on the Galactica? Who makes them breakfast? Mommy, how I get to go on the Galatica? If I eat my fruit can I go?”  I am being thrown questions at a million miles an hour and the coffee is slow dripping into the pot. I am staring at it, wishing I had remembered to set the timer the night before. I am pretty happy that I wiped down the counters, made lunch and put the dirty dishes from dinner in the dishwasher.  I give myself props for that.  Finally the coffee is ready and I suck down a cup in under 5 seconds.

I know that I need to have the Commander dressed before TIT wakes up.  There is military precision to this getting out of the house thing.  So I gather up some clothing in the Commander’s room and bring it to him in the living room where he is actually playing with the iPad nicely and quietly.  “Max, you need to get dressed,” I say handing him an outfit.  I am grateful in the morning that I have two boys, that the fight for getting dressed isn’t as bad as it could be, but still, the sun is barely up and the Battle of the Shirt has begun.  “I hate jeans. I am not wearing jeans.  I need soft pants.”  I don’t argue. I go and get sweatpants and accept the fact that my kid will always look like an extra on the Sopranos in his Russian mobster sweat suit outfit. 

“I hate Spiderman. I am an Angry Bird. I am not wearing that shirt.” So back I go again to retrieve an appropriate shirt.  He quickly moved on from Spiderman to Angry Birds and I didn’t update his wardrobe accordingly and unbeknownst to me, he will no longer wear anything with superheroes on it because that is so last year. I assume this is akin to me not wanting to wear my over-the-knee boots, that fashion has moved forward, but he's 4 and I was hoping a t-shirt is still a t-shirt. I dig through the drawer and locate an Angry Bird pajama top.  I don’t care if he wears pajamas to school, I just care that he will put the fucking shirt on and we get to school.  

“How about this one?” I ask the Commander who puts his iPad down long enough to glance at the shirt.  “No, I don’t want that one. I want the one with the red angry bird, the one who looks like Luke Skywalker.” Truthfully, I have no idea which one he is talking about, which thing looks like Luke Skywalker or where this said shirt could even be.” So I lie. I lie and I lie and I don’t feel remotely bad about it.  “Oh shucks! I think it’s dirty, but guess what?” I say with fake excitement. The Commander pokes his head up and looks excited too. 

I pounce.  “Oh, Mommy was talking to Luke Skywalker yesterday and he sent over a shirt. He said only Jedi Knights could wear it.” Now I have the Commander wrapped around my finger, he is staring at me like I mentioned a 50 % off coupon to Lululemon at a new mom’s class. “I don’t think you can wear that one yet, because you aren’t a Jedi.”  Undeterred, the Commander is calculating his response. “I am a Jedi.  I can wear that shirt.  I can wear it? Please mommy! I’ll eat a piece of fruit like a Jedi. I’ll do it right now.” 

So I am claiming victory because my kid is now sitting eating an organic apple and I can pick any adorable shirt I want, put an Angry Bird sticker on it and the Commander will wear it happily thinking it was a gift from Luke Skywalker.  Now, it’s 7:15 and we need to leave for school in T-minus 1 hour and 10 minutes.  The Commander has been dressed. I contemplate brushing his teeth but not sure I have that battle in me until I have another cup of coffee and now I hear the TIT stirring. 

As soon as the TIT wakes up, he is ready to join the party.  Fearing that he overslept and missed all the good stuff, TIT dashes into the living room to find his brother.  “Max, say good morning to Zac,” I say as I chase down TIT trying to change his loaded diaper as he makes a run for it. “I hate my brother. I don’t want to say hi. I don’t want to say good morning.” I decide it’s not worth the fight and that one day, in the distant future, the two of them will be friends when the Commander needs the TIT to take a geometry test for him.  But the only thing TIT wants is his brother to pay attention to him.  He doesn’t’ care that he is going to get clocked in the face. It’s Pavlovian at this point. TIT steals an angry bird telepod from his brother and the Commander turns around and slugs him side armed.  TIT doesn’t cry.  In fact I think he enjoys the punishment.  He giggles and the Commander does it again. I sip more coffee.

I have managed to get the old diaper off TIT but yet to get the new on when TIT decides to pee on the floor.  I actually don’t even get upset because pee is easy to clean. At this point, I am grateful for this mess which requires only two squares of VIVA paper towels and some spray Lysol. I manage to wrestle TIT to the ground and get him in a new dry diaper. He's pissed and he makes it known that he's not into this WWF diaper change and throws a bucket of crayons on the ground.

 The goal is to get TIT in the high chair and lock him down so I am free to move about the apartment without any major calamities. But TIT knows this trick and he’s gotten smart to my ways.  He squirms as I try to strap him in. “Look at what a yummy breakfast I made you,” I singsong to TIT.  I have a plate of cut waffles with jelly and cream cheese and some cut fresh melon.  We have a stare down for a minute.  TIT looks carefully at the plate, deciding if it meets his standards and I stare at him wondering how long I have until this plate of food becomes a projectile.  I feed him naked because what’s the point in getting him dressed when I know breakfast will be covering him soon. 

There had been silence from the Commander for a while and I look over and he is drinking my husband’s iced coffee.  My husband who has gotten out of bed, poured an iced coffee and left for the gym in under 10 minutes is no where to be found in the morning. I begin to think, and realize that since we have had two kids, he’s been going to the gym a lot more in the morning. Hmmm, wonder why?  “Why are you drinking coffee?” I ask him, grabbing it out of his hands. How it’s possible for a 4 year old to like nearly black, semi-sweetened iced coffee is beyond my realm of understanding.   But the Commander loves coffee and he most certainly doesn’t need it.

As I take the cup away, I see that TIT has taken the waffles covered in jelly and cream cheese and rubbed it all over his face and hair.  There definitely isn’t time to bathe him so I opt to use these materials as styling product giving him a faux hawk and just wipe him down so he doesn’t smell like a bakery in class. He ate nothing but is covered in everything. So I grab the first shirt and first pants I can find in his drawer and then go to finish getting the Commander dressed.  He doesn’t match. I don’t care.

I find the Commander in the bathroom making the water spray from the faucet. He’s naked.  Totally buck-naked again. And we are back to square one!

He his taken off all of his clothing because he “needed to make pee pee” and while I have no idea why one would need to be completely naked to do this, I don’t have time to argue. I need to get him back into his clothing and out the door.  But now his soft pants are wet and the Luke Skywalker Jedi shirt is wet too.  I have no time for a series of negotiations and lies so I grab anything from his room and try to distract him using cookies as I get him re-dressed. 

Miraculously, I get shoes and coats on everyone without any major issues.  The Commander is eating a giant cookie and carrying his Darth Vader mask as we get out of the elevator in the lobby of our building.  People are staring. He makes a dash to the front door, which is open, and I start to run after him nearly leaving TIT in the elevator as the doors close. Thankfully, TIT made it out of the elevator and didn’t go on a joy ride around the building.  “Everyone needs to stop moving,” I say as I scoop up TIT and rein the Commander back. At this point he is wearing the Vader mask and jumping off the lobby furniture humming the Star Wars song. I am pretty sure everyone in our building is praying that we move to the suburbs or that I have my tubes tied. 

I am carrying the Commander’s lunch box, backpack and jacket which he threw on the ground in the elevator, all while holding my 20lb purse and a 30lb toddler.  I nearly topple over squeezing everyone into the car, but when everyone is strapped into their seats and I am only 17 traffic lights from dropping the Commander off at school, I feel a sense of accomplishment.  I look in the backseat and the Commander is dressed as Darth Vader and TIT’s hair gelled back with cream cheese, but they are dressed and semi-fed and semi-clean. I have survived the morning rush…but it’s only Monday.   

The Hangover (Part 1)

The Hangover (Part 1)

Oh yeah, I was feeling good. The music was great, mommy had makeup on and a strapless undergarment and I was out without kids on a Saturday night.  Tucked in the back of my brain, was the reality that tomorrow morning I was going to have to wake up to my kids, but that wasn’t going to stand in the way of being first at the vodka luge, or reaching out to the bartender for another shitty well-vodka drink, or a glass of wine or more shots later.  I was not a mommy at that moment, I was a girl in an LBD.  So I drank and I danced and I had a great night with my friends and my husband at a glamorous party where I was able to not wear my uniform of black leggings and a Lululemon top.

We get home around midnight, not super late and the babysitter has managed to get both my kids to sleep.  I stumble into each of their rooms, just to check and make sure that they are alive, breathing and in pajamas and then I careen into a wall.  Oops.  I was definitely more than buzzed, but who cares, I had fun! I dug into their stash of cookies and chips. “What are you doing?” Matt asks as I am caught eating a bag of animal crackers, the best I could come up with from the pantry. “I am hungry,” I slurred. “I need something to cushion the alcohol.”  I realize at this point that I am pretty drunk, actually more than buzzed, but I also realize that there is nothing I can do about it at this point. So I reach for a Tylenol and a bottle of water and put my head down on the pillow.  Makeup still on, hair still sprayed stiff with hairspray. 

As I drift off to sleep the room spins a little and I realize I am fucked.  I fall asleep dreaming of my bed in my old sorority house, the trashcan placed next to it, just in case I had to wake up and puke.  I picture waking up around 11:30 and walking down the street in Ann Arbor to Amer’s to get bagel and scallion cream cheese. Back in college, hangovers were de rigour. The recovery was painful, but short-lived and we were back at it that night or at least ready to go by Monday night at Rick’s.  But times, they have a changed and the second that the room started to spin I knew the Commander and the TIT 6^th sense would kick in. 

I swear, they know, every time I drink or have one too many “mommy juices”, or stay for one more song; they know.  They talk telepathically in their sleep.  “Let’s fuck with them,” the Commander beams to TIT. “Game on,” TIT responds.  And they plot as their dueling music machines pump out peaceful ocean sounds and they sleep angelically in their matching giraffe pajamas. They make their plans of destruction or world domination and just really fucking with mommy and daddy.

 It wasn’t enough that two pregnancies have reduced me to ordering a good pair of Spanx for Saturday night events or that every time I sneeze I pee myself a little. The Commander and TIT wanted to make sure that if I ever had an ounce of fun ever again, that I would pay and that I would pay dearly.   They were put on this earth for that very purpose.

At 2 am, just as I was lulled to sleep by the motion of my bed, the TIT starts screaming from his crib.  I ignore.  I build the screams into a dream, or more likely, I am just having a nightmare where there is a baby crying which is de rigour for this point in life.  Finally, I hobble my way out of bed and into the TIT’s room.  He’s standing up and crying. I am too tired and at this point hung-over/drunk to deal, so I sit in the chair in his room hoping that my mere presence and his sound machine will force him back to sleep.  He stops crying, which is great, because I am pretty sure that I am going to have to go puke any second.  I am thinking it may make sense to puke because the animal crackers weren’t cushioning the cocktails, they were only adding a more solid mixture to heave up later.  Maybe if I puked, then there would be less alcohol and then in that case, less of a hangover. I am contemplating this logic as I rise from his chair, thinking the TIT didn’t have what it takes to really bring me down and I head to the bathroom.  But TIT surprises me, he is more man-baby than I gave him credit for and as soon as I stand from the chair, he is back yelling again. 

At this point, I think it makes a lot of sense to bring him into my bed.  Yes, that’s the solution, I think as I go and pull him from his crib.  I will bring him into my bed and he will cuddle up next to me and drift back off to sleep.  He just wants the warmth of mommy’s body.  So I carry TIT into my room and put him next to Matt who has managed to sleep through all this so far.  At first, TIT looks like this was going to appease him and rolls a few times coming to rest face down between the two of us.  But it was only a momentary diversion.  Seconds later, TIT slides down to the foot of the bed, scoots off and heads for the Commander’s room.  Fearing that it would be an all-out overnight battle if the Commander were to be awoken by TIT, I grab TIT and take him back to his room. I give him Motrin.  For no other reason then I hope that whatever woke him up would be soothed by 1.875 ml of the good grape flavored goo. 

I manage to fall back to sleep for a few hours, but it’s horrible sleep and not even really deserving to be called sleep, more of just an unconscious state which is neither restful or restorative.  Around daybreak, the Commander comes flying into our room.  On any other morning this would have been a battle won, because it usually occurs closer to 3 am, but not this morning.  “Your turn,” I say kicking Matt.  So Matt falls out of bed and takes the Commander into the living room to watch Cailou or Duck Dynasty or whatever the fuck we can put on and will keep him quiet.  There is silence for a few minutes and I dive back under the covers and try to close my eyes for a little bit. 

And then the real nightmare begins, the one that happens only when you are awake at 6 am and severely hungover….and only happens to us.

“He just shit on the floor!” Matt comes in and screams at me. He looks frantic and slightly green.  I am confused.  For a moment, I think Chief, our 200lb incontinent English Mastiff has returned from the dead. “What?” I say. “What is going on?”

I run to the hall bathroom and find a pile of diarrhea on the floor.  And this shit; I am not prepared to deal with. Literally and figuratively. “What the F happened?” I ask Matt. I remember even in this moment to say “what the F” and not “what the fuck” and I impress myself.  “He was standing up to pee and then this.” He points to a pile on the floor.  The Commander looks distraught, who wouldn’t be and I don’t want to make a big deal out of this because this shit can scar a kid.  So I try to pretend it’s no big deal and diarrhea happens to everyone and who hasn’t crapped a massive pile of steaming poop all over the floor? “You clean it up,” I say to Matt who is looking at me like I just asked him to eat a live goldfish covered in the diarrhea.

 “No way! You clean it,” he comes back with, but I pull the trump card that I use every time there is a situation like this. “I carried both these children for a combined 18 months of my life.  I gained a combined 64lbs to produce these children.  I had my abdomen cut opened and had two children pulled from it.  This shit: this is your job.  I am taking my timecard and punching out right now.” With that, I take the Commander into the other bathroom with an iPad and bring Matt a roll of paper towels and 5 bottles of Lysol, bleach and any other thing which says disinfectant on it. 

I hear Matt ganging in the bathroom.  “I think I am going to puke,” he says from behind the closed bathroom door and I am kinda jealous because I still think if I had puked at 2 am, then I would not feel as shitty as I do right now.  There are many things which do not go well with a hangover, but cleaning up human feces from the floor may be the worst of them.  Secretly I am hoping that the Commander will be slowed by his current stomach condition.  He’s seated on a toilet playing Angry Birds and pooping which resembles mud shooting out of a canon.  I am wishing I didn’t eat animal crackers, but very glad I didn’t eat anything chocolate.  By 7 am, the diarrhea has passed and the Commander was dressed in a Darth Vader mask tearing up the living room completely oblivious to the fact my I was scrubbing shit out of the grout in the bathroom tile.  Because there is a god, TIT still was asleep so Matt and I just diapered the Commander up and tried to come to grips with the reality that was going to be our day. 

“We need a sitter,” he says. “We can’t go all day like this.  We aren’t going to make it.” The Commander shows no signs of his earlier ailment and by this point is building a space shuttle out of my shoes and last night’s dress.  So I am trying to find someone at that hour to come for a little bit so that we could sleep off some of this hangover when the TIT wakes up.  I don’t even ask Matt to get him; he now owns the trump card for the day.  I sold my soul to the devil and for the rest of the day, I am going to need to do everything and the first thing I need to do is get a babysitter STAT. Any sitter is fine, anyone without a pedophile record would do at this point.  I take a huge swig of my coffee and another Tylenol and I go bring TIT out of his room.  I swear, he looks at me with delight when he sees the hangover, my eye makeup crawling down my face like a spider race, and he makes his evil plans for the morning.  

First starts the screeching, even louder than usual. Next on tap, TIT decides to pick a fight with his brother over the magna-tiles which the Commander had started using as missiles for his spaceship.  After that war subsides, TIT decides to pull out the heavy artillery and turns on his toy vacuum cleaner that hums a loud and annoying buzz at the same time, he pushes Sing with Me Elmo’s foot, 11,000 times in a row! Each time I try and turn it off, TIT screams louder and turns it back on.  I hope Elmo dies or I die first to end this suffering. I look at Matt and we just give up.  They broke us.  They knew we were weakened. They knew we had fun. They will not rest until they have destroyed us, broken our will and all of the furniture.  As I consider what I always consider on mornings like this (giving up drinking forever and hopping a flight ALONE to Aruba), a sitter texts me back that she can come over at 11am.  Matt and I high-five and decide to approach the next three hours with as much stamina as we can muster. 

We give the Commander some bubbles to blow which amuses TIT. And we think we are winning the battle because they are entertaining each other and we are nursing our hangovers. It doesn’t last for long because TIT gets a hold of the bubbles and dumps it all over the floor which enrages the Commander.  How it is possible to shit an entire TCBY pile of fudge-colored yogurt and a few short hours later rebound well enough to beat up your brother, escapes both of us.  And before we can even give it further thought, the saint which was our sitter arrives. 

We don’t go into detail.  We don’t explain the shower curtain which is missing from the bathroom in the hall, or the giant trash bag filled with fecal stained paper towels or the litany of chemicals which are lining the counter in the bathroom.  We don’t mention the hangovers that may destroy us if we don’t sleep it off.  “Just don’t let him eat anything odd. He had some stomach issues,” I say.  “We will be in our room if you need anything.”  Matt and I get into bed. We don’t bother to wash our faces or brush our teeth. We don’t speak. We cheers with our bottles of Poland Spring to never drinking again or at least better planning and having a sitter come at 5 am! And I am grateful that tomorrow is Monday and that the Commander will be in school and for the moment, while my head blissful hits the pillow, I forget entirely the storm which is coming that will yet again cancel school!

Dear Waiter, I am Sorry

Dear Waiter, I am Sorry.

You see us coming when we walk into the restaurant, the enormous stroller with a howling toddler and a larger toddler who is wearing a batman cape.  And you pray, you pray that we are seated in someone else’s section.  You see my husband who looks as if he has been stricken with Ebola or some other horrific flesh-eating fatal disease, the pain on his face of what is to come.  And then you and I make eye contact and I try to offer my sympathies and tell you, I am right there with you.  I don’t want to be here anymore than you want me to here.  But sometimes, on those rare and terrible occasions you need to bring your whole family to a restaurant for a family meal. The concept of family meals sounds so cute and wholesome, but let’s be honest: this is really how it goes.

You, poor waiter, try to figure out where to park my enormous stroller with the giant footboard where my older one stands.  You size it up, realizing this thing doesn’t collapse and it’s like parking a minivan in a spot for a Mini Cooper.  When we finally are seated, you are cursing us already.  I get it. I would curse me too. I suck.  But this ain’t no picnic for me either. 

When we try to shove TIT in the highchair, he screams. Why wouldn’t he scream when it looks so much more fun for a 15 month old to run around a restaurant and inspect everything from the gum under the table to the swinging kitchen doors?  And of course the strap on the highchair is broken because when have you ever gone to a restaurant where the strap works.  “Screw it,” Matt says. “Just put him in there. He won’t jump out. YOU can just entertain him.” Fun for me!!!

But waiter, I have got some helpful hints for you that may make this process go a little smoother for everyone:

11.     My 15 month old, The TIT, doesn’t need a full utensil set up.  Please don’t give him a knife and a fork.  He will only use these objects as projectiles or as weapons to stab at his parents or his brother.  While he does have some decent fine motor skillz, cutting steak with a steak knife isn’t one of them.

22.     If you have crayons! Awesome!  But again, don’t give them to TIT because he will eat them and poop out rainbow colored waxy poop which will make me freak out and call the pediatrician because I would have completely forgotten that he ate the crayons because I would have buried this whole experience in my subconscious moments after we leave.  If you give Crayons to the Commander and a sheet with princesses to color assume that shit won’t fly with him and he will most likely color your walls drawing an Angry Bird scene which will look nothing like an Angry Bird scene but more like huge swipes and black and red marks.  I apologize for not watching him more closely but your highchair has no buckle and I need to keep my eye peeled for TIT trying to make his escape head first out of the highchair.

33.     Let me also suggest that you need not provide glassware to either of my children. We BYOSC (bring our own sippy cups).  That just seems obvious and I don’t think I need to elaborate here on why that’s not going to work out in your favor.  But let’s just say broken glass makes a lot of noise and will be even MORE disrupting to your other customers than what is coming anyway.

44.     Let me give you a heads up.  If you see a group of moms with multiple kids coming. First of all, don’t shake your head in despair.  And if you go and set up the table, you cannot put all the highchairs in a row on one side of the table.  It needs to go: mom, baby, mom, baby.  Babies can’t feed themselves and far worse, they can’t feed each other.  So lets save some headache for the table rearrange and set it up correctly the first time.

55.     When we order alcohol, bring it fast. VERY fast. We obviously need it.  We will be more patient and better parents for the rest  of the meal.

66.     You may not want to seat us next to men in suits.  Food flies. Enough said.

I do my best to respect other diners when we attempt this family meal.  We don’t take our kids out to a fancy French restaurant at 8pm on a Saturday night. We eat when ancient people eat, at 5pm when most of the wait staff is setting up for the real people coming later.  So really, I feel no need to apologize to other diners who decided to eat at 5:30 on a Tuesday night.  I am sorry my kids are loud and the Commander is jumping on the banquet in his cape swinging his imaginary web slinger towards your table. And I feel a little bad that the TIT is making loud stabbed seal noises and throwing pasta and broccoli. But if you feel the need to condemn my mothering, don’t expect me to be silent.  Yea, I mean you – you nasty old hag at El Vez who screamed at the Commander.  It’s not your job to parent my kids, focus on your taco and Shut the Fuck up!

Also, waiter – we aren’t looking for a “dining experience”.  Don’t feel the need to bring the courses slowly.  Just slap that shit down as fast as it can get out of the kitchen.  If we order appetizers it’s only because we are super hungry and because we haven’t eaten since our 5 am breakfast.  We don’t want our kids meals to come out with our entrees.  Just bring it all out at the same time and get it out fast! Raw chicken is fine! But while you are at it, if you can just take all the piping hot items and toss them in the freezer for a minute. I give you this advice because it really is a horrible sight when you see a tiny toddler take a big bite of scorching hot chicken fingers only to scream in excruciating pain because it’s burning. 

Please don’t judge us when my toddler is playing with hand sanitizer foam and finger painting on the table because I forgot to reload the toy portion of my diaper bag.  If there are no matchbox cars for TIT then I need to improvise.  Necessity is the mother of all inventions and I am one fucking innovative mom. “Give him something to play with,” Matt says as the TIT is trying to reach for the salt and peppershakers.  I start digging through my bag, only realize what was once in there has been lost or just gone.  So I get real creative and I put some hand sanitizing foam on the table in front of him and let him finger-paint.  I think, whoa I am brilliant! Not only is kid entertained for the next 37 seconds, but also he will have germ free hands. I fucking rock!!

The Commander, if he doesn’t have an Ipad, because Mommy forgot to pack for this meal like a trans-Atlantic migration, makes his own fun under the table.  I am not sure exactly what is going on under there, but he hasn’t bitten my ankle and nothing has broken so I don’t see the harm in letting him hang out in the “ice cave” under the table and eating whatever TIT discarded on the ground or the kid before him, or the kid before him.  So consider we may be actually helping clean in hard to reach places. Please don’t shoot me nasty looks because I am going to come over and slap you on the back so your face freezes like that.  And if TIT does escape from his highchair, which is bound to happen, just smile at him when we walk back and forth and back and forth and back and forth and back and forth and back and forth, looking at what’s on our neighbors plates and at all the exciting things on the servers’ stand.  We are trying to be fast about this. I swear! You can tell by the forkful of salad in my one hand as I am wandering around the restaurant eating and chasing TIT. 

Dear Waiter, your goal should be to get us out of the restaurant with as little carnage as possible and as fast as possible.  Thank us for providing you with free birth control.  Most likely after your shift, you are not going to want to have any unprotected sex.  We have put off parenting in your mind for another 10 years.  I am sorry for the debris minefield of food, but you knew that was coming. And yes, we always tip well! If I have made it through the meal unscathed without any major malfunction, I am grateful to you and my fellow diners.  And you deserve your 25%, you earned it.