I Want My Epidural Back (7 page)

Dear Granny, Grampy, Nana, and Pop Pop,

Thank you sooooo much for taking care of the kids next week so the hubby and I can go away for the first time in years. I know I'm just supposed to be appreciative, so lemme tell you a little something that I would appreciate. I would appreciate coming back to the same kids we left behind. 'Cause in the past when we've left them with you for just one evening, we come back and I literally can't tell where their buttholes are because both kids have turned into the most gigantic assholes I've ever seen. I know you think that taking care of your grandpoopers is your chance to relive the glory days, but these are not YOUR kids. These are OUR kids. And if they act more a-holey than usual when we return, then going on vacation has actually made life more stressful, which means I just paid a shitload of money for my life to get worse.

So here you go, my little geriatric friends. This is a list of shit NOT to do while we are gone:

      
  1. Please do not constantly stuff my kids with candy. For some reason whenever I walk out of the room you suddenly turn into a Mexican piñata maker and stuff my kids silly with candy like they're hollow papier-mâché donkeys. If we get back and the kids are high on Pixy Stix and Pop Rocks, I'm putting a blindfold on, grabbing a stick, and beating the crap out of the nearest grandparent.

      
  2. Please do not keep the TV on constantly in the background. (a) Since you have the volume turned up to 99, it is not in the background, and (b) if my kids watch TV for a week straight they will literally turn into zombies and suck your brains out. Karma.

      
  3. Speaking of television, please do not let them watch shows other than the ones that are on the “approved” list. Because if they get hooked on
Caillou
or
Max & Ruby
or some other annoying show, I am going on Pinterest and I'm learning how to make thongs out of dental floss and then I am going into your closet and secretly replacing all your granny panties.

      
  4. Seat belts, car seats, bike helmets, pill bottles, sunscreen, plastic bags, sharp objects, EpiPens, etc., etc., etc. These things are not debatable. Yeah, I know you think you're joking when you say it's a miracle your own kids are alive today, but I'm dead serious when I answer, “Yes, it is.”

      
  5. Please do not send my kids out to play at 9 a.m. and call them back in for dinner at 5 p.m. like it's the good ol' days. Because playing with the neighbors all day is super fun until you find out the neighbor is a sixty-year-old man with a Polaroid camera, an anonymous Instagram account, and more duct tape than Home Depot.

      
  6. Bedtime is not two hours AFTER bedtime. And two minutes BEFORE bedtime is not a good time to start watching a movie or make chocolate sundaes or go outside to play. Just because I'm adjusting to a different time zone doesn't mean they have to too.

      
  7. Please do not let them skip school or their activities while we are gone. I know you think it's okay because it's just a special treat, but guess what? Not learning how to do math or read is not a special treat. And neither is being a homeless person who lives under a bridge because you can't get a job because you don't know how to do math or read.

      
  8. Okay, here's some shit I don't want to find when I get back to my house: whistles, horns, xylophones, cowbells, finger paints, permanent markers, window markers, bath crayons, fake weapons, real weapons, lawn ornaments, new pets, or
other annoying shit that wasn't in my house when I left. If you desperately feel the need to buy them something, buy them underwear. Or buy them jewelry to give to me.

      
  9. When I hand you the list of emergency phone numbers, please don't poo-poo me and toss them aside. I'm not questioning your ability to handle an emergency. I'm questioning your ability to know the pediatrician's phone number off the top of your head when my kid pokes his eyeball out with the scissors you gave him.

     
10. If one of the kids misses us, do not tell them we cannot bother Mommy and Daddy on vacation. Put the iPad in their hands and let them Skype us. Please take note that I did not say, “You should Skype us.” I said, “Let THEM Skype us.” Because you're absolutely right, YOU don't want to bother us on vacation.

That's it. Have an awesome time! And just remember, one day in the not too distant future, we will be choosing where you live.

                                       
Love and kisses,

                                       
THE parents

Sometimes I feel a little guilty that my kids never learn very much at home, until I remember, wait a sec, yes they do. I teach them new vocabulary words every day!

DOO DOO DOO DOO DOOOOOO
, driving home from the library where I just dropped off eleven books that were just a few days late and one book that was due seventeen weeks ago but I didn't know about it until the library called me to ask me where the F it was so I had to search around the house like a maniac and finally found it under Holden's mattress. WTF, kid, it's a book about ferrets, not a
Playboy
.

Hmmm, maybe I'll take a longer route home. You know, because it's the scenic route. Bwhahahahaha. There is no such thing as the scenic route in our town. Ohhhh, look at the beautiful sunset over DSW. Seriously, that's as pretty as it gets. Not that I haven't bought some seriously beautiful shoes there.

Anyways, no, there is another reason I'm deciding to take the longer route home, but I'm embarrassed to tell you. I'm a little scared you're gonna think I'm a nutjob. Not that you don't already think that, but even more of a nutjob. Okay, wait, before I explain why I take the longer route home and embarrass myself, here's the backstory.

So a few years ago, I was at a playdate and my friend and I had this conversation.

BELLE:
Did you hear about the boy in Springfield?

ME:
No.

BELLE:
At the hot dog place?

ME:
Do I want to hear?

Nope, no, I do not want to hear. Because even though I'm sitting there praying she says something like, “He found a finger in his French fries” or “He got kicked out of the restaurant for pooping on the table,” I'm pretty sure from the tone of her voice that this is going to be worse. Much worse.

BELLE:
He choked on a hot dog.

ME:
(silence)

BELLE:
And died.

A million questions go through my head. Where were his parents? Had they cut the hot dog in half? Were the kids sitting at a different table and no one noticed? Did they just find him slumped over and then realize? Did they notice while it was happening and try to do the Heimlich? Did they sweep his mouth with their finger and push the hot dog farther into his throat? Did the mother scream? Did the whole restaurant notice this was going on? Was the boy afraid? Oh my God, how awful.

And for years, I've been thinking about it. I mean not incessantly every single day, but pretty much every time I cut a hot dog in half for my kiddos, I think about that boy and his poor, poor family.

Before I had kids, this kind of story would spontaneously combust in my mind a few minutes after I heard it, but nowadays, there's a little section of my brain where these stories stack up and haunt me. The boy who went to the public pool with his camp and drowned. The girl who was crushed by the bookshelf that fell on her. The two-year-old who went down for a nap and didn't wake up. I mean this kind of shit doesn't happen every day, but it gets talked about so much, you would think it's not all that rare.

And then I heard the worst one of all. I flipped on my television one day (thank God the kids weren't around) and there it was. Newtown. Oh my God. Not OMG because this is way too serious for an acronym. Oh my God, oh my God, OH MY GOD. As I watched the news unfold, my heart broke into a thousand pieces for those families. I would say
I can't imagine,
but I can. I imagine it all the time. What that scene must have looked like with all those adorable little first graders. The thought of waiting for your kid to come out of the school, and waiting. And waiting.

Hold on a sec, I need to grab a tissue. Seriously, it is impossible for me to think about Newtown without getting teary-eyed.

And here's the thing. It's turned me into a crazy person. I mean the hot dog story made me start cutting my kids' hot dogs down the center, and the bookshelf kid made me bolt my one and only bookshelf to the wall even though it's in the guest room
where the kids never go, and the two-year-old who never woke up made me watch the video monitor a little closer, but the Newtown story has literally made me act like a crazy person. It's what makes me take the longer route home from the library. Not every day, but once in a while. Why?

Because the longer route means I can drive by my daughter's school.

About a block away, I start looking for flashing lights. Are there any cop cars or fire engines? Nope, the school looks peaceful from the outside. But Newtown probably looked peaceful from the outside too. At least until everyone started running out. And then I'm closer to the school and I see a man going in. Is he a workman or a teacher or is he some messed-up kind of psychopath who has two guns under his coat that he's going to whip out when he gets to the office? My mind starts to go to a bad place, but then I see that he's just a sandwich delivery guy. Phew. But I hate that I even think this way. It cannot be normal.

And sometimes when Zoey's jumping out of the car in the morning, I make her jump back in to give me a kiss or I'm careful to yell, “I love you!!” even though three minutes earlier I was going ballistic on her because she wouldn't put her seat belt on. I make sure that last moment when I say good-bye for the day is extra loving. Because what if it's the last time?

I can't be totally crazy because I'm not the only one who's thinking about the worst-case scenario. One day earlier this year, Zoey came home from school and told me they practiced a lockdown drill, you know, in case a skunk got into the building. That's
what they told the kids since they're only kindergarteners and how can they tell a bunch of kindergarteners that it's actually because a crazy man went into a school in Newtown and sprayed all the first graders with bullets and turned all those sweet little babies into angels. No, we can't tell kindergarteners that.

I guess I'm a grown-up so I can handle it. But not really.

(Zoey and I both just farted at the same time)

ZOEY:
Jinx fart.

Who the hell knew that if two people fart at the same time, it's a jinx fart? My kindergartener might not know how to read yet, but she's learned what a jinx fart is at school. Awesome.

                                       
Dear Zoey's school,

                                       
I want my money back.