All kids are born with certain hardwired behaviors that are just inherently present in their little baby brains. These things aren't learned behaviors...kids just know how to do the following... Destroy a clean room in a matter of seconds , Ask "Are We There Yet" 462 times on a car ride, and my favorite - EMBARRASS THE HELL OUT OUT OF THEIR PARENTS...
So the other day we had pulled in the driveway after a run to get mommy some coffee at Dunkin Donuts and our very nice mailman - "mailman Al" was just coming through to deliver our mail. Al is a pleasant,unassuming man in his early 60's - who delivers our mail at the exact same time every day. We see him and wave, make the usual small talk - you know..."It's a scorcher out there today - stay cool!"....that sort of thing. Anyway, the kids had just hopped out of the car when we saw Al, and both Lauren & Ben went running up to him screaming "Daddy!" WHAT?? I. WAS. MORTIFIED. !!!!! First of all - WHY? And secondly, how the hell do you recover from something like that? I did a quick scan of the neighbors houses to see if anyone was outside to witness this fiasco, then gave Al the best eye roll and "Oh those silly kids" look I could muster as I shook my head and laughed. Al, in attempt to save some face and escape the embarrassment, handed me one piece of mail and said, "that's all I got today!" To which I replied "Well, No Ga-news is Good Ga-news"... Yes, I quoted Gary Gnu from The Great Space Coaster. I don't know why....I guess I was just all thrown off from the awkwardness of the moment. But yep - I did it. I'm pretty sure Al had no idea what I was talking about, as he shot me a strange glance and chuckled nervously, then walked as fast as I'd ever seen him walk - bee lining out of our yard - AKA - The Land of Crazy. I don't how things deteriorated so quickly that morning, but that's all it takes - a 20 second exchange with the mailman is all it takes to earn the label of "the crazy house". When we got inside I asked the kids why they would do that and they just laughed. Evil little taunting laughs.
Just days later...and still reeling from the Mailman Al fiasco...I had the kids at the movies. It was one of those oppressively hot and humid days where the AC had been on full blast for days on end and I needed to give our electric bill a break, so I figured I'd take the kids to see a movie where it's nice & cool. We weren't the only ones with the same idea, as the movie theater was jam packed. At the end of the movie I took both kids into the bathroom for a potty break. At this age, I need to take them both in to the bathroom every time one of us has to go - at 3 & 4 they're obviously too young to wait outside the bathroom stall for mommy, so any kind of privacy is just off the table. So there we are in the big family sized bathroom stall - all the other stalls were occupied and there was a line out the door of people waiting to use the facilities. And it's my turn to "go". As usual, both kids are staring at me - they like to praise me - as I praise them - for using the potty - occasionally blurting out "Good Job, Mama! You go on the potty like a big girl!" I can hear people in line waiting chuckling a little. Ok. I mean, nothing too personal - right? Well then....and I apologize in advance for the TMI...but this story was a must tell....I pull a pad out of my purse..monthly feminine issues and all that fun - and both kids are looking on totally puzzled. OH GOD. I try to distract them by giving them my iPhone to play games with - and hopefully not snap a picture of me and mistakenly put it on Facebook - but no, they didn't want anything to do with the phone. The bewildered looks on their little faces watching the pad secured in place... I mean, what else could I do??? And then Ben looks at Lauren and screams -SCREAMS- "Mama wears a diaper!!" And Lauren's mouth opened wide as she realized that's what was going on here, and she screams, "Mama, you wear a DIAPER! Mama, you not potty trained! Mama you go pee pee in your diaper!" I'm not kidding you when I tell you there were at least 12 other people in the bathroom and another 10 in line. 22 people. At least. I tried to "Shhhh" the kids. I told them it wasn't a diaper. "Then what is it Mama?" I contemplated my explanation options and decided on "It's not for babies to know about". ???? I just wanted to get out of there at that point. All I can say is that when we came out of the bathroom stall, all eyes were on us. And as the kids washed their little hands they were abuzz about their new revelation. There was nothing I could possibly do but give the other women in that bathroom the little smile that said "I'm going home to start drinking"...
Needless to say, the kids are still talking about it - I hear them talking amongst themselves in the backseat of the car or when they're doing an art project. Like they're trying to figure out how and why mommy still wears a diaper. Maybe...if I'm really lucky - next time we see mailman Al, they'll mention it to him. Yep - wouldn't that just be great ga-news??
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