Parenting problems

"Honey, get out of that sewage pipe!”

This is the call I heard from an exasperated young mother in the park a few days ago.
“It’s just muddy water and stones!” her son called back.

“No sweetie, it’s sewage. Do you know what sewage is?” The mom then proceeded to get on her hands and knees to pull her child out of the tantalizing opening of the sewage tunnel.

I tried to picture what I would do in this mom’s situation. I couldn’t picture myself crawling into sewage to rescue my child. Instead I saw myself watching on from a nearby lawn chair, laughing in resignation and maybe helplessly shouting out some vague suggestion like “try not to swallow any.”

It made me start to question what kind of mother I would be.

I have had one experience with parenting, and I can only hope it was no indication of how I will act if a real human being ever actually emerges from my body and starts looking to me for love and protection.

When I was 6, I saw a TV commercial for a doll called Newborn Baby Alive. I had never had much interest in dolls, but what was special about this one was that she cried and wet herself. I could do without the peeing, but I became obsessed with the idea of having a baby that cried. Even then, I had a sick and inexplicable leaning toward all things sad.

So you can imagine my excitement when this orphan child was waiting under the tree for me on Christmas morning. And you can also imagine my disappointment when, after hours of play, I realized that my Newborn Baby Alive simply would not cry. It did not display any emotion whatsoever. In real babies, I believe this is called “failure to thrive.” In consumer America, this is called false advertising.

I tried everything to upset this doll (It would be years until I would finally understand that the experience of emotion is limited to things that are alive. To be fair, though, her name did have the word “alive” in it, so that was a little confusing.)

“I don’t love you,” I remember telling it, hoping that the sting of my harsh words might elicit some reaction. “You are stupid.”

I studied its face for any trace of a budding tear. Nothing.

“I’m moving,” I told it. “I’m moving to Colorado, and you can’t come with me because I don’t love you.”

Nothing.

“I love all my stuffed animals, but not you.”

It peed a little.

And that’s how it came to be that Newborn Baby Alive got drop-kicked against the wall, abandoned for my next dream which was to build a Lego pirate ship that captured innocent sailors and forced them to walk the plank to meet their untimely deaths.
I have realized that, if I ever have kids, they will probably be running off into sewage pipes just to escape me. And sadly, they will probably be better off if they do.