Guilty pleasures

Most of the time the blog feels like a vanity/therapy project as people so rarely comment on anything I write making it hard to know if people are reading the blog or even slightly care one way or the other about anything I write.

So, I know I’ve hit pay-dirt with a post when it not only spurs comments, but makes friends and family comment anonymously. It’s great fun for me to try to figure out who “anonymous” actually is, but I do wonder if my “framily” out there are anonymous out of laziness or because they want to avoid an argument with a slightly crazed and somewhat PPD, tired mom.

My last post generated such an anonymous comment and it has had me thinking. BC (before children) was I the evil-eye giver and I think the answer is sometimes, but under the same conditions that I would be doing it now WC (with children).

I have a bit of a reputation amongst the framily for being a bit of a bee-yatch, for complaining at stores and restaurants and often generally making my opinion known whether folks want to hear it or not (I can feel my sister thinking about my recent public shaming of a woman who let her dog crap on the sidewalk and didn’t clean it up). And, yes, BC that would have included doling out the eye to people allowing their kids to wreak havoc in CERTAIN situations, keyword being certain.

BC, just like WC, I don’t think that I should have to listen to a screaming toddler when I am fine dining, at the opera, concert or other theatre event, in the library during exams, at a grown-up movie, etc. But BC, just like WC, I think I was fairly tolerant of these displays say at Safeway or Walmart or the park or the library in general and dare I say, the freaking mall food court at 1 in the afternoon. Call me crazy, but I used to think and still do think that there are places where it is reasonable to expect the environment to be free of unruly children just as there are many environments where you just kind of have to accept screaming babies, crazed preschoolers and loud children (oh my!).

Some of the framily forget that I have spent the last 6 years of my life working with kids and families and only the last three years of my life WC . . . the job opened my eyes to a lot of realities about kids, perhaps making me wait as long as I did to be a mom (there’s only so many times you can find yourself cleaning up other people’s kids’ pee and vomit off the program room floor and furniture before you question if you’re really ready for parenthood). So my eyes were opened and a certain tolerance developed for public displays of childishness, and over the last 6 years I have tried to be a good citizen in that respect.

Anyway,I think I’m done ranting and justifying to myself (and anonymous – FYI, I think I’ve narrowed it down to 3 of you) that I am not a completely different human being WC as compared to BC. Very different, but not completely different, I hope.

And speaking of unruly children and guilty pleasures, la bebe has a cold and was up ALL night giving me totally screwed up and broken up sleep. I think the longest stretch I got was about an hour. So, early this morning I told D Sr. that even though our cleaning ladies were coming over in a few hours to tell them NOT to clean the master bedroom and I would try to get this child and myself to sleep. After about 2 hours of solid sleep, I cannot describe the euphoria of emerging from the bedroom with a cranky baby to a freshly cleaned house. I still feel guilt about the excess of cleaning ladies coming over twice a month, but somehow I’m able to justify it.