August 12 ~ It Takes One To Know One

Growing up, I always thought I was wise and mature for my age.

I thought I was always right.

I thought I had all of the answers.

Not that I'd brag about my great wisdom. ~ Mostly I kept it to myself, because heaven forbid I'd come across like a bragger, or a know-it-all, or some other schmuckity-ass-brained type of person whom no one could stand to be around.

But internally, I was a superior, all-knowing, being of insight and wisdom. ~ If people would only ask for my advice.....the world would be a better place. No one asked.
But hey, not my fault.

Somewhere along the way, I woke up.

I can't pinpoint it. ~ Maybe sometime in my mid-late 20's.... DEFINITELY by the time I'd had kids.

I used to cringe when I'd see an angry faced mother holding her screaming faced child by the arm in the grocery store. My thinking would waiver from a prim: "If she were consistent in her disciplinary techniques this wouldn't happen" ~ to a mortified: "That poor child. What an awful parent!"

That was until I experienced what it feels like first hand to have a child go (for NO reason, mind you) LOUDLY and insanely ballistic in a public place.

Reasoning with the unreasonable doesn't work.

All you can do is leave the location as quickly as possible...at which time the screaming monster becomes boneless...or rigid...or alternates between the two so that lifting him/her looks like a lesson in wrestling. And the only other problem with leaving.... is that sometimes that is exactly what the little monster wants. You leave: Monster wins.

If they win once.......they want to win EVERY time.

And so it begins...

You find yourself gritting your teeth, trying not to look visibly crazed (Have you ever felt your pulse in your eyeballs?), as you drag the screaming monster through that grocery store (which you've put off doing for two weeks due to the dread of this moment) until you get at least the minimum amount of groceries into the cart...
And then try to not burst into tears yourself as you see the cold, condenscending, expressions of the "not yet parents but we'll be so much better at it than you" and the "my kids would never have done that in my day" and the " hasn't had kids, won't be having kids" sets.

Oddly enough, after burning 800 calories in sweat while shopping, you get the monster securely locked back into the car seat (which, can be a WHOLE new war zone!!) and, as you drive home, you look through your rearview mirror at that little monster face now sleeping from tantrum exhaustion.....

all you can do is smile...and wonder to yourself if noon is too early for a glass of wine. (g)