So B brought this home for me to read. And it ticked me off. It kind of reminded me of a recent MSNBC article: No Brats Allowed: Is American society increasingly intolerant of tots? (And anyone who knows my work history will instantly realize that I empathize on the part of the children's department bookstore employee in the MSNBC article.) But the question: Is America Becoming Intolerant of Kids? -- I think is a good one. And I'd have to say that no, Americans aren't intolerant of bratty children. We're intolerant of bratty parents.

Case in point...

His crime? Being only 3 years old
JENNY SOKOL
Columnist
The Orange County Register
bjs92@adelphia.net
http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/life/columns/article_1258591.php

Ice water is pooling on the woman in 36D's lap. She's fuming; steam practically billowing above her head.

I knew we were flying the unfriendly skies the instant my son, daughter and I wedged ourselves in the middle seats of the five-seat center aisle row.

36D peered with disdain at my 3-year-old. His nose wasn't crusty, his eyes weren't goopy and there were no stains on his shirt. As far as I could tell, the kid appeared moderately clean and charming. His major offense? Parking himself in seat 36E.

The woman arranged her blanket and drifted to sleep before the plane pulled away from the terminal. Sometime between reaching cruising altitude and the in-flight movie, Tiger-Wiger the stuffed animal tumbled to the floor. As my son struggled with his seatbelt to rescue him, he unintentionally bumped into 36D's legs. Hard. Her eyes flew open; I believe flames shot out of her pupils.

"Oops," my son whispered. "Saw-wee."

She scowled and repositioned her pillow.

"It's OK," I assured him when he turned to me. "It was an accident." I pulled him close and whispered, "Don't worry; I don't think she likes kids."

He squished his nose angrily, shocked.

"No, no," I explained. "I mean, she probably just doesn't even like people."

He folded his arms across his chest.

"Sort-of like a ... witch," I added.

He flinched in fear and then leaned into me, blinking back tears.

I backtracked. "I'm sure she's not a really bad witch or anything, but let's not touch her again, OK, buddy?"

For four more hours, I added silently, peeking at Wicked Witch.

When the flight attendant carefully handed my son a full cup of ice water, I experienced a flicker of premonition, but dismissed it. Sure, my son is cursed with a grip disorder that causes him to spill nearly every beverage he comes into contact with. My novel was engaging, though, and he seemed content clomping plastic dinosaurs on his tray table.

Suddenly, Wicked Witch's legs and arms are flailing wildly. She's snorting like an angry dragon. My son is frozen, staring at his empty cup on her lap.

Tiger-Wiger is wet; he rubs him with his 3-inch napkin as the Wicked Witch bangs her call button.

"I need paper towels!" she barks.

As she looks at my son, I suddenly see him as she does: a bratty nuisance hell-bent on disturbing her.

What I see is the angel I awakened at quarter to four in the morning. The child I asked to sit straight and still for nearly five hours to satisfy a ridiculously grumpy woman.

He catches my eye and we grin ever so slightly at our unspoken secret: He has melted the Wicked Witch.

CONTACT US: bjs@adelphia.net

I think it is disgusting that parents use their children as expressions of their passive aggressive anger, the way Sokol does above.

What gets me is this: it was as though she was willing her son to spill on the "Wicked Witch." If you know your child has a spilling problem--just put the water on your friggin' tray, no matter how engaging your novel is: take control of the situation. Instead, she labeled this woman a "Wicked Witch" simply because she assumed that she doesn't like children--even though the woman said nothing and did nothing a regular passenger wouldn't do. I can only assume that Sokol created this prejudice based upon the fact that the woman didn't fawn over the little boy: "Well, if she doesn't fawn over my adorable three-year-old she must hate children, and by extension, she must not like people either." Dude, the woman just wanted to sleep on her flight... Instead Sokol unfairly punished the woman by allowing her spill-prone son to have control of his own glass of water on an airplane. Then she grins at her son after he spills on the woman? What the heck is she teaching the next generation?

Ugh.

So is America Becoming Intolerant of Kids? I'd say no. I realize that most of the craziness I encountered in the kid's section was due to moronic adults. We're just becoming intolerant of STUPID PARENTS who feel ENTITLED to harass, steal and create unsanitary conditions and health hazards for others (remember my stories about the layers of poo that covered the floor of the children's department in Barnes & Noble?).

I fear that the current generation of children being raised in these manners will lack common courtesy. For instance, while at a bookstore, or heck, just any store, make sure your kid doesn't color in a book that isn't meant to be colored in--and if they do, you should be expected buy it because the store can no longer sell it. Do not leave your child unattended in children sections just because there are employees bustling about--they don't have the time or the energy to keep an eye on your kid who is your responsibility in the first place. Make sure you don't bring a baby or a toddler to a movie theater--they really have no business being there, not even a family or PG movie, they can't really enjoy it the way a 7 year old can anyway. If you're on a plane and your baby is crying and you can't stop him, at least apologize to the people around you--a simple apology would go a long way because at least they'd know you were trying to be a considerate passenger.

And for goodness sakes: keep the cups of water on your own tray--don't take your passive aggressive bullshit out on unassuming passengers.

While I'm on my soapbox: stop assuming that people who don't go gaa-gaa over three-year-olds are "Wicked Witches." It's a dangerous stereotype. As women, we should respect each other's choices whether we procreate or not... we shouldn't make the world harder to navigate simply because we chose differing paths.

Labels: cfbc, childfree by choice, children, news, parenthood, parents

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God, I love Deadwood. It brings the best out of all of us.

Labels: television

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Is this an ironic statement of pregnancy, a sort of commentary on our times dealie, or is this woman a little too proud of herself?

I'll let you decide.

Labels: parenthood, pregnancy

( 5comments )

at August 21, 2006 7:26 PM  Alex_Knight said...

That is the scariest costume ever! And exploits the poor child before it's even born! She should be ashamed of herself.

 

at August 21, 2006 7:26 PM  Lorie said...

She has a bun...in...the oven...*twitch* Man, I hate puns, even when costume-based.

I guess some women are just really proud of their bellies when they're pregnant. There was a pregnant woman on Pants Off Dance Off once, and she said she was most excited about the chance to show off her stomach. And there's an All Info About site on pregnancy which I've heard has quite a large belly photo gallery. I haven't personally felt any desire to peruse it.

 

at August 22, 2006 1:34 PM  Anonymous said...

Yum. Self basting.

 

at August 22, 2006 1:35 PM  Samantha said...

What's Pants Off Dance Off? I'm a little worried about the lack of pants...

 

at August 22, 2006 3:05 PM  Lorie said...

Yeah, Pants Off Dance Off isn't a show I'm proud of watching. I find myself drawn to it everytime I come across it, though. It's pretty much exactly what it sounds like. People dance in front of a music video while stripping. You get this weird assortment of strippers, burlesque performers, European guys, and people who are just free with their bodies. You can get an idea of the dancing from clips on the show's website (don't worry - they pixelate the actual naked bits), but it's better on TV with the video playing in the background, and then they have random clips of the dancers saying things like why they decided to dance and why they deserve to win. There were even several episodes hosted by Jodie Sweetin, which just added to the weirdness of the whole thing.

 

My friend Princess Blogonoke is getting married in about two weeks. And so I thought it might be cool to pass on the sound advice of the experienced, for her and for future visiors. Please feel free to leave your own advice at the bottom.

For wedding-related stuff:

1) If you're not paying for the wedding, then you basically have no say in the planning.

When my husband and I got married, we were 20 and 22. We wanted to have a very small wedding, just immediate family (because he has like 22 aunts & uncles that he has barely spoken to since he was 12, and since he's literally the baby of his entire family, he has even more adult cousins he also barely knows). I invited all of 10 people to our wedding (four of which were bridesmaids, the rest were my family). But our wedding guest list ended up being 120. I was annoyed because we were willing to pay for our wedding ourselves--and it wouldn't have cost that much. But when his mom stepped in and was like, "Well, I want it this way and we have to invite my friends because I was invited to their childrens' weddings, so we'll just pay for it." We were like, "Whatever."

2) The wedding really doesn't matter.

The wedding is just one day. Marriage is the rest of your life (if you're lucky). So if the planning is annoying or stressful--just stop. Because in four years, it isn't going to matter anyway. Ditto for the wedding and reception, if people are getting drunk and being obnoxious, it isn't going to make you look bad, it's going to make them look bad.

As for marriage stuff...

1) Make sure you marry your best friend.

Because if they're really your best friend, everything is going to be fun. Even doing the stinky laundry is going to be fun.

2) Ask yourself: Does this person bring out the best in me and do I bring out the best in him or her?

Best friends/soulmates will always bring out your best--but not in a fake or phony sort of way. They will motivate you and support you to achieve your dreams. And the least you can do is reciprocate for them. ;)

3) He CANNOT read your mind. Seriously.

Do not "test" your spouse. It's pointless and you're just going to hurt everyone in the end when you leave the dishes in the sink as a strange kind of contest to find out who will crack first, and the weirdo tension it builds up in the air is so not worth it. Even if you saw your parents do this growing up--do NOT repeat this vicious cycle. Simply asking nicely will do the trick.

4) Speaking of asking nicely: just because you ask now doesn't mean it'll get done now.

And does it really matter if it gets done *this* minute or in a couple hours? Unless it's an emergency, like you're chopping veggies and you cut off your hand and can't physically dial a phone, then taking out the garbage, emptying the dishwasher and folding the laundry can wait through the end of Star Trek or the baseball game.

5) Do not just have a kid before you're 30 so you won't be "too old" later on.

I know for me, and thankfully for most of the people I am close to, getting married was about spending our lives together--it was not a means to an end (simply having children). However, for some of the people B and I have come across (usually in the workplace) people have children for, well, really weird reasons. For instance, some people seem to have children for "Obligatory" reasons--these are the people who get pregnant by accident and decide not to terminate. Conversely, these are the people who feel pressured or required to have children.

There's these two guys at my husband's work who got into the CFBC debate this week (while my husband decided to stay out of it). The father told the CFBC guy that he'll regret it later on. And the CFBC guy told the father, "I collect degrees, not children," as the CFBC guy has both a bachelor and master's degree. The father replied, "That doesn't matter. You'll still regret it." The CFBC guy responds, "Okay. Convince me. Why did you want kids?" And the father says, "Well, my parents had and raised me and it's my duty to do the same for someone else." The CFBC guy started laughing, and though that's kind of a harsh response to someone's face, it really does seem like an illogical reason! But at least the dad was honest, it's not a very good answer, but it's his. And sadly, I think that's what a lot of people really do think.

Time somehow always ends up being a culprit for people rushing in making this decision. At B's work, he knows another guy who is 30 and his wife is 24, and they just had their baby three months ago. They wanted to have kids, which is great, but they wanted to have them before the wife was "too old." I think as young people, especially as women, we're sort-of indoctrinated that if we're going to have children, we need to have them by 30 (or even younger) so the babies will be as healthy as possible, so our bodies will bounce back to their size 4s as soon as possible, so we won't be paying for college at the same time as retirement, etc. The list of reasons to have children before 30 are endless, and arbitrary.

It's hard enough to be married and to adjust to the latent expectations each of you will have about marriage, expectations you didn't even realize you had, but it'll be even harder to throw a baby into that mix. Plus, these years are precious because it's just the two of you, once you have kids it'll be a very long time before it'll just be the two of you again--even if you manage a vacation away from children, you're never really "away" mentally. Furthermore, if you have a strong foundation between the two of you, it'll make having children a lot easier and a lot more joyful because you will have grown together as a committed couple first.

I do not want to beleaguer this topic, but I recently have run across the best book I've ever read on this topic of whether or not to have children. It's called: The Baby Decision: How To Make The Most Important Decision of Your Life. It's not actually sold on Amazon, as it's out of print, it was published in 1981. However, I can attest that even though it's 25 years old, it's still as relevant today. Even more so, as there is no other book currently on the market like it. And I've decided to include an excerpt from the book for anyone who wants to read it:

The late humanistic psychologist Abraham Maslow distinguished between two kinds of motivation--growth motivation and deficiency motivation. When a person is motivated by deficiency or safety needs, he or she acts out of a desire to decrease anxiety. Any kind of change seems too risky, and therefore frightening, to undertake. On the other hand, when a person is motivated by growth needs, his or her actions reflect a desire for greater fulfillment. The risks seem less important than the possibility of improving one's life.

This distinction between growth and safety needs applies equally well to the decision-making process in general, and to the baby decision in particular. There are, in fact, six possible baby decisions, three of which are growth decisions and three of which are safety decisions.

The three growth decisions are:
1. The decision to become a parent.
2. The decision to remain childfree.
3. The decision to postpone the decision, but with definite goals for the postponement period and a target date for re-evaluation.

Why are these "growth decisions?" Because when you make them you:

- Take responsibility for yourself.
- Take a risk.
- Make a commitment.
- Learn something about yourself.
- Have an opportunity to use all four of the above actions to develop and grow.

The three safety decisions are:

1. The nondecision to have a baby (also known as the "nonaccidental accident"). After perhaps five years of marriage with no previous "accidents," a couple struggling with the baby decision suddenly have an "accident." It may be unconscious (such as forgetting to take the pill), or conscious ("Let's not bother to put more jelly in with the diaphragm"); it may be a joint accident or the result of one spouse's actions. However it happens, the result of such a nondecision (besides the baby) is that the couple are taken off the hook. They declare themselves victims and avoid having to answer to anybody--including themselves--for their "decision."

2. The nondecision to remain childfree. In this situation, a couple tell themselves and others that they don't know whether they want children. Maybe later on, they say. So they simply drift without ever making a conscious commitment to the childfree lifestyle. And, in the process, they don't have to admit their desire to remain childfree or deal with the disapproval from others or their own fear of regrets.

3. The nondecision to agonize. This is the antithesis of the growth decision to postpone. In the latter case, a couple postpones the decision for specified reasons and a finite period of time, in order to meet specified goals. However, in this type of nondecision, a couple set no goals; rather, they circle the issue frantically, full of doubt and confusion. Although they claim they would love nothing better than a resolution, they actually get a payoff--in the form of unhealthy satisfaction generated by their painful soul-searching.

Although all three of the safety decisions appear to be emotionally cheaper in the short run, they are more costly in the long run. Nondecision-makers are bound to feel like victims rather than masters of their own fate. While they may avoid the momentary agony of making difficult choices, they are actually condemning themselves to chronic pain. By clinging to a safety decision, they miss an opportunity to take stock and use what they learn about themselves. In fact, safety decisions really are danger decisions because they are detrimental to development. If you make a nondecision, you won't have to deal with your pain directly, but you'll never really get rid of it either.

That's the just the beginning of the book. The whole book allows you to evaluate your reasons to parent and to remain childfree without judgment. I feel as though Merle Bombardieri has no personal agenda that she is pushing on the readers--whereas other motherhood or CFBC books feel as though they're holding one choice above the others. Bombardieri is just truly concerned with helping/enabling the readers to make the best personal decision they can for their own lives, regardless of the direction their decision takes.

Labels: books, cfbc, childfree by choice, children, men, parenthood, pregnancy, questions, real life, the children question, uncomfortable questions, women

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So we just got back from a fashion show and eating sushi afterwards.

We are so L.A.

Labels: los angeles

( 1comments )

at August 16, 2006 6:59 PM  Monica said...

You & B at a fashion show? What else has LA done to you?

 

So apparently I have figured out how to elicit the most traffic to my blog. Apparently if I mention Britney Spears, the world will go crazy. Well here's my pathetic attempt: Nerdslut.net: Hotter than Britney Spears Nude, or at least more controversial.

To both me and my husband, my previous post was so obviously a joke. Except, perhaps, my final paragraph where I do worry if one day in the future American citizens will ever be interred again under new-fangled rhetoric. But the rest was, in my opinion, and in the opinion of my husband (and really our opinions are the only ones I care about these days), freakin' hilarious. I mean, come on! It was brilliant to compare the uselessness of informing the country of the level of terror via color coding by comparing it to the uselessness of Britney Spears being featured on the cover of a magazine, ya know, just to remind us that she's still around.

And obviously I have hit a nerve.

I guess the OPINIONATED public will go create more of their own USELESS blogs like this one and rant about things they know absolutely nothing about.

Like you.

Anonymous Reader That Just Surfed In

Heheheh. But not truly anonymous. I have your IP address and I know you're from Maryland. And your ISP is Hughes Network Systems! My powers are being used for evil! Muwahahahaha!

But seriously... if the person is from Maryland, chances are they might work for the government, so he might actually have an informed opinion on the subject. And usually I abhor anonymous postings, I think they're cowardly. But if he works for the government, then perhaps it's required he keeps his identity a secret. Like a super-assassin/spy. So I'll allow it.

On to the next!

you make zero sense!
you are also very strange and obviously consider yourself superior to everyone else.

nikki

Nikki, whose ISP is Qwest Communications Corporation, at least did not remain anonymous, and for that I applaud her. However, she is quite obviously a Britney Spears fan and thus I deem her irrelevant.

I happen to think it's pretty awesome that my satire has elicited such strong emotions that people feel inclined to comment, and so snidely, as well. Must mean I'm on to something with this comparison of our government to Britney Spears thing.

I will not be repressed!

Labels: art, writing

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I would just like to say that we are all morons. What does the national terror level do for our country? Well, I think it's kind of like Britney Spears. A few months ago, I saw on MSNBC that Britney did an exclusive "candid" interview where she cried to Matt Lauer about being stalked by papparazi and the ridicule she endures for being "country" (read: bad mother). Immediately afterwards, Harper's Bazaar ran this photo on the cover of their magazine:

Did Britney have a reason to be the cover? No. She was simply knocked up--again. She doesn't have a new album coming out. She isn't doing another movie, or even a stupid music video. She was getting this much needed, and wholly unnecessary, publicity for absolutely nothing--well, maybe not absolutely nothing. She was (is) in desperate need of an image overhaul. (And I have to admit the naked cover photo is way more visually appealing than the horrendous preggie-pre-teen outfit she wore with Matt Lauer, so perhaps her fashion sense was also in need of rescue.)

So I deduce that the government does the same exact thing. When it needs some publicity, we get a jack to the threat level color code. What's the point of this? Is it to test the limit of civilian complacency? Or maybe it's to remind us that we're all in constant imminent danger from terrorists who want nothing more than to hijack our vacations and the government is the only one who can keep us safe? I have no idea.

But how much longer are we going to throw out our freakin' water bottles, lip gloss, sunscreen and shampoo in order to live under the facade of "security"? How is my parting with reading material or a frappucino going to ensure my or anyone else's survival? It makes no logical sense... Much in the same way as Britney Spears being on the cover of a magazine when she has no body of work to promote makes no logical sense.

Laura Yeager left four bottles of Gucci and Cartier perfume for the hotel maid before heading to the Atlanta airport for her flight back to Philadelphia. She still had to give up her lip gloss at the security checkpoint.

She just shrugged and tossed it. "It's better to feel safe. We thought it was going to be a lot worse."

It's already worse. Are these terror plots real or is the government seeing how much the public is willing to swallow?

Kathy McMahon, 49, of Mill Valley, Calif., was frantically helping her daughter stuff sunscreen, makeup, contact lens solution and other liquids into every corner of her half-dozen suitcases to be checked as she headed off to college.

"I think it's ridiculous," McMahon said. "But we'll do it anyway. What are you going to do?"

I wonder what the public will do when American citizens start getting "re-located" to "safe houses" or when citizens' business and houses begin to be seized for "security purposes" a la Japanese Internment Camps. I've known people whose families were thrown into poverty from those camps, and it kills me to think we might be heading down the same road, except with different rhetoric.

Labels: art, blazin' awesome, children, fashion, government, news, pregnancy

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