Parenting requires a lot of resolve. Which is why parents, of all people, should make resolutions. (resolve – resolutions – root word, geddit?) Your approach may mean the difference between your child becoming a Hitler or a Ben Tennyson.
Here are my resolutions for 2010.
1. Must not refer to myself as Superdad.
Seriously guys, I’m totally overrated. I change a few diapers, take a couple of feeds and I get a prefix that implies overriding awesomeness and infinite ability? To me, a Superdad is someone who brings home the bacon – in a vehicle like this.
Honey, I'm home.
2. Must stop calling wife “retard” and “moron” (and vice versa – not in the sense of “must stop calling retards and morons ‘wife'”, but as in Daf should also stop calling me names, ah, you did get it the first time).
This started waaaaaay back in when we were first dating and we attended this “terms of endearment” course in school, the lecturer was going on about semantics, semiotics and how 80% of all communication is non-verbal. Which was to say you could call your honey-pumpkin “Nazi Puppy” if you say it in the most awshucks, sweety-pie-sixteen voice and STILL could make her goosebumps stand. You got to try it to believe it.
So in a totally non-derogatory sense we have been calling each other “hey moron“, “what’s up, retard” for years and people around us are so used to it, they think our marriage is on the rocks otherwise “Did you call her ‘sweetheart??’ Are you guys quarreling again?” Plus it *helps* put people at ease when they’re doing projects with us.
[Sidenote: Daf and I pulled of this awesome scam a few years back. We were introduced through a friend of ours to this lady and for some reason she immediately assumed we were siblings (as apparently, we both look alike, fair enough). This went on for almost a year and every single time this lady bumped into us she would go “Hey, why are you guys always together? You’re giving people the wrong idea, how to find girl friend and boyfriend, like that?”
We were having a meal one day with a bunch of friends and she couldn’t help but to remark again on our perpetual proximity to one another until a bewildered mutual friend went “What the hell are you talking about, they’ve been together for 4 years!”
Total awesomeness.]
Thing is Truett has been a sponge of late and taken to calling Daf “baaaaaaabbbbbeee” in the way i call her when she’s across the room/hallway/hawker centre from a distance. It’s only a matter of time – if we don’t stop – he’s gonna calling his friends mentally-handicapped individuals in the un-PC way. If people ask, I’ll say something along the lines of how the nurses at Mt A thought he had failed the Oscar test and mentioned it to him repeatedly when he was under phototherapy. Poor boy.
3. Must stop grinning and nodding approvingly when child does something awesome (but dangerous).
I’m a firm believer that parents should always think their kids are the most awesome (I know, i overuse the word. It’s an “honorable mention” sort of resolution to cut down on it) creatures to have roamed the earth, the finest species of mankind ever produced and vastly superior to all other children be it red or yellow black and white.
But when Tru attempts to fling himself off a 2m high platform and lands immaculately with a shoulder roll (that’s *how* parachutists do it, mate), one must not get carried away with thoughts of son being the incarnate of Maximus Decimus Meridius and do celebratory chariot race around the playground with him on piggy back.
That is because he may actually get injured or worse, die, although I do think its more important that what you do in life echoes in eternity!!
4. Must not play Winning Eleven/Football Manager/FIFA and leave kids unattended.
When you become a parent, you basically surrender all rights to personal rest and recreation. No afternoon naps, no late mornings, no movies, no GAMING.
So on the off-chance I get presented with the opportunity to cradle a Playstation 3 controller in the bosom of my fatherly being (ok, yucky expression), i unleash the repressed desires of my sub-thirty-year-old consciousness to get my GAME ON.
This happens on the weekly visit to Mother-in-law’s house, because Brother-in-law (BIL), despite being only a year younger, is very much single, certainly kidless, free from the shackles of feeds and woggly baby legs. As such his status enables him to be the proud owner of the holy trinity of gaming consoles – the PS3, the XBOX 360 and the Nintendo Wii.
The ideal is when everybody is around i.e. the adult to baby ratio readjusted to a favourable 5:2 whereby I get to play reasonably undisturbed. The problem only arises in a 2:2 ratio where it becomes a rather iffy situation if the 2 adults are in question BIL (player 1) and “superdad” a.k.a player 2.
BIL has a rather nifty stereo system hooked up to the gaming “altar” so it drowns out the sound of screaming kids in the adjacent room, not that I *ever* did that. I’m just saying it y’all.
5. Must not buy toys that promote either 300 B.C or 2010A.D violence.
It started off innocuously with two water pistols which i thought would be handy in giving me some added range for taking down those pesky ceiling lizards. However it also marked the introduction of “pulling the trigger”, “aiming”, and “shooting to KILL” to a nineteen-month old boy.
A visit to a friend’s house not too long after became the initiation to swords, then maces then death-by-steamrolling and finally, chainsaws. I’m not even joking about the use of chainsaws; without going into the details it was a game of “doctor” gone wrong – horribly wrong.
Therefore, Truett and Kirsten will play with cuddly bears, petite trucks and vegetarian dinosaurs at most. That way they may secure a job in the United Nations or Green Peace. And we all know how important the United Nations are.
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So that’s my list of parenting resolutions. Feel free to be inspired. You’re welcome.
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