Ever read something that makes you want to reach through the computer screen and throttle the writer like Homer throttling Bart? Current members of our federal administration notwithstanding. Every so often, I go look up some topic on a site that sounds suspiciously like B@byc3nt3r.com. I couldn’t help but have my eyeballs assaulted by some of the ‘parent discussion’ on daycare- I was looking for a checklist of what to look for in a daycare center, and they cutesily pull posts from their boards appropriate to the topic at hand and put them there.
And lo and behold, there was a post which began, “Ladies”, which is a bad sign on this place anyway, and went on to beseech us to examine our lives and determine if we really needed all the crap that we buy or if we could give up our jobs and focus on simple needs and our child, and not have to put them in the horror of daycare, and how we’ve become a ridiculous society and we’re putting our selfish needs for stuff above the good of our child.
Dear sir, hold still while I strut on over there in my Modellista clogs, my J Crew sweater, and my Old Navy Jeans and smack you upside the head with my favorite All-Clad frypan. Granted, because of our current fiscal condition (for those of you who have not been playing along from home, thanks to my being a consultant last year, we got bent over sans lube on taxes. My god, am I watching the Alternative Miminum Tax debate with interest- a phrase I never thought I’d utter- because if the year we get out from under the burden of Self-Employment Tax we then get hit with AMT, My Wrath Will Be The Stuff Of Legend. As it stands, we could get one hell of a refund next year, which would warm the cockles of my little heart and go straight into ‘need to repair/upgrade’ and ’savings’, as opposed to being blown on a faboo vacation. I think. Talk to me again when the memory of Napa is faded and my hair’’s gone half grey from being the parent of a toddler, by that point I may be all ‘Fuck responsible! Let’s go to Tuscany!’) rampant spending is not happening in this household.
So of course, right now, I am filled with unholy lust for all manner of crap. Shams for the bed so it actually looks like a nice bed despite the fact that we do not have a ‘bed-like furniture object’ encasing the mattress and boxspring. A new, matching set of bowl mugs to replace the chipped, older than god mishmosh of cups we have. New lighting in the kitchen. Shorts for summer. Enormous bath sheet sized towels in silvery-grey for our bathroom. Magazine storage boxes so I can organize my every growing, creeping, and gaining sentience backlog of cooking magazines. An honest to god dresser and night-stand for the Lad. A desk set for me, with in and out boxes. Plenty of printing paper, neatly organized. Shelving for the closet in the guest room. Pull-out racks for the pantry, so I can yank them out and see what food we actually own. A bar unit for the living room so the alcohol isn’t eating 1/6 of the usable space of my pantry. Storage cannisters (flour, sugar, etc) that aren’t 12 years old and made of now cloudy and gross plastic. A luscious stack of books for me to take an hour a night and read. Pillar candles for the bath. I need none of these things, but right now, me want! This is my spring ritual. Dissatisfaction with the nest.
The fact is, though, I do not work for these things. Sure, I work because it provides us a comfortable standard of living, etc etc. We are ridiculously fortunate that I do not have to have a high powered career- or, er, much of a career at all- in order to make ends meet. But more importantly, I work because it keeps me from going bugfucking insane. It keeps me talking to adults, and using parts of my brain that parenthood doesn’t, and I realize, accept, and embrace that I am not one of those people who can be fulfilled solely by being a parent. More power to them, but that ain’t me. And so, dear obnoxo poster on B@byc3nt3r, wailing and gnashing your teeth that my placing my child in daycare is emblematic of my embracing material culture at the expense of my child, no. It’s emblematic of my embracing my sanity in tandem with, and respect for, the well-being of my child. If I am swirly-eyed and mad with intellectual deprivation because the 300th viewing of Cookie Monster’s Origin Event on our favorite show, I am not as good or effective a parent as I am when I am fulfilled in other areas of my life, my brain firing on all cylinders.
Plus, we’re saving up for the hellishly expensive gas line installation. Because for my birthday, my mother and husband are getting me the goddamn cooktop! On which I can use my All-clad and cook foie gras and truffles. Yeah baby.
