I love my kids, I just hate parenting
Earlier this year, when I wrote about the lack of Disney in children’s lives earlier this year, a few people chimed in to tell me I have a blind spot because I don’t have a daughter.
Which is exactly right.
But Disney is not just about girls – nor is it particularly absent – when you consider all the properties they own. Which you’ll be able to do at will this fall, since Disney is now on Netflix.
I’m not that great of a parent. Not when you consider my parenting fails.
I’m probably an okay dad, in the whole “good time guy” way some dads are. I get along with my kids, we like to horse around and goof around and get around ooh ooh I get around! (God I’m old.) But I yell too much, and I say “no” too much, and I say “don’t do that” too much, and my five-year-old definitely prefers his mom. After all, I’m the bad cop.
But sometimes my bad parenting actually works out. Some of my parenting fails are actually kind of wins!
If you’ve been following me on social media, you probably know that I’ve been on my own the past few days.
We were at my parents for the holiday weekend, and while I came back to NYC on Tuesday to go to work, Mom and Buried and the kids stuck around. The kids got to hang with Grandma (consequences be damned) and Mom and Buried was able to get some work done without paying for a babysitter. Or camp.
Meanwhile, I was living the high life, bachelor style! FREEDOM!
When I was a kid, we visited Disney World.
At some point we ended up on a breakfast cruise, and there are pictures of me there, cherub-faced and smiling wide, surrounded by Mickey and Minnie, Chip and Dale, Cinderella, and assorted other Disney characters. I don’t remember it, but I’ve seen pictures, and I have no doubt it was one of the happiest days of my life. (We visited Disneyland too, but come on. There’s a reason all the pictures from that trip are from Universal Studios.)
I worshiped Disney as a kid. My five-year-old has no idea what Disney is.
Parenting is stressful.
It’s challenging, it’s tiring, and worst of all, it’s important. I don’t care if you have one kid, two kids, five kids, or are the Duggars. Being a parent is like living inside a pressure cooker. And, it gets hotter every day.
Especially when you turn up the heat by having multiple children. You know what they say: Mo kids mo problems!