Browsing Tag

crap

love bites

A beautiful disaster

worst day of my life

It’s the dichotomies in life that make it exciting. I suppose life would be awfully boring if everything went smoothly all the time and it’s the stench of poop that makes roses smell sweeter. So here’s the story of how we got a nice, giant whiff of crap yesterday.

It was meant to be a delayed birthday celebration and we had made plans to take a day off without the kid. To recapture the old days, as it were. The plan was to leave Tru at my mom’s place (grandmas are lifesavers) and head out for a show, a nice dinner and maybe a relaxing walk.

The day started pretty good. For lack of a better option, we ended up watching Star Trek, a total geeky, fanboy kinda show. 10 minutes in, I was totally lost as they went on and on about the transponders and other whatnot gizmos, so I spent the next 2 hours ogling at Chris Pine.

It looked set to be another usual, humdrum outing as we headed back to the car. That’s when the fun started. To our horror, we realized that we had lost the car key, and it was the last set we had. It’s one of those moments where time slows to a halt and a string of expletives made its way to the top of my mind as the gravity of the situation sank in. It could have been lost anywhere along Orchard Road and it’s practically worse than looking for a needle in a haystack.

I decided to sit my pregnant ass down like a vagrant by the side of the road while the husband sprinted down Orchard Road looking for the lost key. I was so depressed that I thought of whipping out my trusty little tin can to make some spare cash while waiting, but even the can was in the car and all I had was my mobile phone. Bummer.

After spending 20 mins checking all the possible places, the key was still nowhere to be found, and our last hope was the cinema, which was screening another show till 11.05 pm. With 90 mins to burn and all the shops closed, we were all dejected as we trudged down to Mackers for a mango smoothie. You know how they say music is food for the soul? Of all the songs in the world, they had to play Ironic by Alanis Morisette to capture the plight that we were in. So there we were, feeling sorry for ourselves and wandering aimlessly like a bunch of delinquents.

Long story short, the cinema managed to retrieve the key and we almost hugged the nice lady at the ticket booth (whose name was Jelly, I’m serious). I’ve never been this happy to see a car key. Mraz has a classic line that says “it takes a loss before you found it”.

The relief at finding something you almost gave up all hope on is a huge rush. It was 11.15 and we had missed our dinner but hey, we did get our walk, (just like the old days) multiple times up and down Orchard Road peering at people’s feet.

And that kinda makes today seem extra nice and beautiful.

motherhood

A Crapload of Lessons

My nine-month-old boy drew a painting on the floor today, albeit a crappy one (no, literally, it was drawn entirely out of crap). It was quite a masterpiece, really. Other kids draw with crayons, but mine prefers a more organic alternative.

Lesson 1. Do not leave crap lying around

You’d think I know this by now, considering the number of times my mom has told me, ” Don’t leave your crap lying around”. Now, if I just listened to my mom, I would not be scraping crap off my hardwood floor.

We were already running late, and I was scrambling to get my little Picasso all changed and ready. I didn’t think much about it at that time, and I just left his soiled diaper on the floor, meaning to throw it after I got myself ready. Somehow, in the 10 minutes I took to bathe and change, Tru managed to unwrap the diaper, dig out a whole load of crap and smear it all over the bedroom floor.

Lesson 2. Boys are drawn to crap (hence, refer to lesson 1)

This lesson into the male psyche is not just meant for mothers. As long as you are in regular contact with a boy/man/dude/guy, you’d do well to remember this. After some extensive research, I’ve come to the conclusion that men are naturally drawn to crap and its variants (faeces, boogers, ear wax). I suspect it’s the texture, or their unusually high tolerance for funky odors, or simply their primal masculine instinct.

I haven’t heard of a girl playing with poop before, but plenty of boys have valiantly braved the way into the wonderful world of crap. I have a friend whose son ate dog droppings, another one who meticulously covered his cot with his own droppings, and yet another who dissected someone else’s droppings in the name of science, to find out what it was made of.

And if you pay enough attention, you’ll probably notice male counterparts rolling up their boogers and flicking it or picking at dirt from between their toes and playing with it. Some things don’t change.

Lesson 3. Learn to laugh at crap

So, back to the story. I stood in awe at the work of art that was laid before me for a whole minute before I knew how to react. I could either shriek and throw a hissy fit (tempting as it seemed), or throw my head back and laugh at the absurdity of the situation. I chose the latter, mostly because it was far less likely to give me hemorrhoids, and because I knew that if I didn’t learn to laugh, I’d probably come to resent these little moments which make motherhood the lovely adventure that it is.