I love my kids, I just hate parenting
I came across this image – Flyer? E-vite? Sign posted at the gates of Hell? – on Facebook a few weeks ago, and while I wanted to write about it immediately, I was too possessed with confusion and rage to put my words together.
Thankfully, my confusion has subsided.
BUT MY RAGE HAS NOT!
There are a lot of reasons a parent might want to lighten their load with a little help from their friends, whether said friends be alcohol, marijuana, Xanax, or boarding school. You have kids. You get it. Sometimes you need to relieve some stress. Parenting on drugs is tempting, to say the least.
I haven’t sent my kids away (yet), and I’ve never been much of a pill guy (there but for the grace of God and all). So these days I mostly drink. Kids have a tendency to make that necessary. You’re on Facebook. You get it.
There was a time — way back in college — when I might have done a little more than drink. Lately, now that the stigma is gone and the criminality is going away as well, I’m wondering if it might be time to explore a return to Honalee with everyone’s favorite magic dragon.
Since September, my first-grader’s reading skills have exploded.
He went from being nervous about reading in front of the class to pointing out every word he sees to reading full books on his own – and being excited to do it. It’s been amazing to watch the growth over the course of the school year, and while I was never worried about him being behind in some imaginary race to another developmental milestone, it’s definitely gratifying.
I’m excited for the growth to continue and to be able to introduce him to some of the many books I loved when I was a little dude. Of course, as is the case with every new skill your children acquire, there are some drawbacks.
When I get home from work, I’m pretty spent.
My days are usually filled with meetings and deadlines and fire drills and brainstorming and phone calls — capped off by a long commute on a crowded subway. So, by the time I get home, the last thing I want to do is something mentally taxing. I want a drink, a seat and some television.
But, alas, I have kids, so before I get to do those things, I have to deal with the fruit of my loins first. And that means common core.
Disclosure: This post is in collaboration with DIYZ. All opinions of apps and companies that help me complete DIY projects are my own.
When we moved to Raleigh in 2012, we bought a dining room table which came with a bench. But, the only bench the store had available was the display model. It wasn’t without some wear and tear, but we needed it. Obviously, a mere year and a half later, when we got back to Brooklyn, it broke.
The wood splintered on one of the legs and it was no longer stable enough to use. It seemed fixable, at least for someone who can fix things (read: not me), so we kept it in storage for when Mom and Buried got remarried.
To her chagrin, we’re still together, and the bench is still broken.