Idiot Wind is Blowing Strong

"Idiot wind, blowing every time you move your mouth/ Blowing down the backroads headin’ south/ Idiot wind, blowing every time you move your teeth/
You’re an idiot, babe/ It’s a wonder that you still know how to breathe." - "Idiot Wind" by Bob Dylan

I am outraged! Seriously, I have seen two things in the past few days that make me want to scream, call social services, and punch idiot parents in their stupid faces. What has gotten me so irate? Allow me to explain.

On Friday, I spent a couple of hours at the park with the girls. This is a nice park in one of the more upscale areas of my town. It's not the kind of place where one would expect to see graffiti on the bathroom walls, cigarette butts on the sidewalks, or evidence of teenage liasons left behind that almost certainly would provoke children to ask some very uncomfortable questions. And most of the people who visit this park fit right in with its wholesome feel. Most people. Then there is the family I saw last week. It was a young couple, late teens maybe, and their little boy who looked like he was about three years old. This sweet child that was running around happily, blissfully unaware that he is the offspring of morons, was wearing a t-shirt that had "Future Pimp" scrawled right across the front. Really? Seriously? Why would a parent do that?!

And please don't think that I feel the bad judgement shown by these parents has anything to do with their age. I think that even though most teenagers/young adults are not ready to be parents, there are always exceptions. That's one reason why I wanted to write the Willow Ryan series, with the main character being a teenage mother having and raising a baby on her own. There are some teenagers out there who are mature, responsible, and selfless enough to successfully raise children, and I find them incredibly inspiring. But these people at the playground, they are just idiots. It doesn't matter if you're 15, 30, or 45, dressing your child in a shirt that proclaims to the world that they will grow up to be a man who sells women for sex is a crime. Or at least it should be. And I am appalled that this shirt even exists.

Then today I saw something else that made smoke and fire shoot out of my ears and nostils like some crazed cartoon character. I had just dropped the kids off at school and was driving through a nice part of downtown Norfolk, VA, when I saw a woman walking with a little girl who was probably about four or five. The woman was dressed in a business suit, she was holding the child's hand, and everything seemed so normal they almost didn't even register in my brain. Until I stopped at a red light and looked at the child. On the back of her shirt was the word "Bootylicious", with an arrow pointing down toward her rear end. I was hoping that maybe I was losing my mind, I had forgotten how to read, or maybe I was going blind and didn't see the words clearly, but no, I was right upon taking a second look.

HOW IS THIS ACCEPTABLE?! Who does these things to their children? Part of a parent's job is to protect their kids, and dressing them in clothes that call negative attention to them, sexualize them, and disrepect them and those of us around them who have an ounce of class and decency, does the exact opposite. Why do things like this even happen? Apparently the idiot wind is blowing really strong in my part of the world.

I Was Blowing Kerosene (Gym Moms Revisited)

"And the breath from my chest I was blowing kerosene/ My lips and fingertips were stone/ I wore my heart on my jeans." - "Wherefore Art Thou, Elvis?" by The Gaslight Anthem

Okay everybody, are you ready for a rant? If you said yes, boy do I have a story for you. After reading this you will understand why this amazing Gaslight tune is my song of the day.

If you read my post from a few days ago, you already know how I feel about the Gym Moms, the parents that annoy the heck out of me while I watch the girls I take care of do gymnastics twice a week. For the most part I ignore it, just thinking snarcastic (snarky + sarcastic) thoughts in my head and subtly rolling my eyes as needed. Today I spoke my mind.

Sitting behind me on the bleachers was a woman whose picture belongs in the dictionary next to the term trailer trash. Harsh, I know, but today I'm calling them like I see them. I sat for nearly an hour listening to her belittle almost every child in the gym, commenting in her irritating, loud voice, on their weight, body shape, strength, skill level, etc. She described the five-year-old I nanny for was the wild girl with skinny legs. I said nothing, allowing my emotions to reach a boil, until two minutes later when I gave "my kid" a thumb's up for doing a flip. The evil Gym Mom tapped me on the shoulder and asked in a sickingly sweet Southern drawl if that was my child. I turned around, recoiling at the sound of her voice, and asked in a sarcastic tone, "The one with the skinny legs?"

Ms. Trailer Trash said nothing, she just stared like a deer caught in the headlights. I said that yes, she's my kid, but I wouldn't expect her to know that since she had been spending the whole hour criticizing every child in the building, except for her own of course. I went on to tell her that I pray none of those kids heard her comments, because no child should go home thinking that there is something wrong with how they look or what they do. She got this snooty, offended look on her face and said, "Oh, I didn't realize anyone could hear me. Why didn't you say she's your daughter sooner?"

Remaining calm like I had been the whole time, I responded in an even voice, "Because I am her nanny. She isn't my daughter but yes, she is my kid, and judging by your many remarks about all of these children, I figured you were too ignorant to understand anything rational I could have said." Take that Gym Mom!

She ended up moving to a different section of the bleachers (where she sat quietly for the rest of the class, thank you very much!), and as she walked past, I smiled and told her to have a nice day, polite as always. I don't think I'll be having any more problems with her, and hopefully I spared a child or two from hearing insults that could cause them a lifetime of trouble. Gymnastics is a competitive enough sport without having parents like that adding to the pressure. She was lucky I have enough self-control not to talk with my fists like I wanted to. She would have deserved it too, because there is never a reason to talk about an innocent, defenseless child like that. Never.

So that, my friends, is my rant of the day. And you know what? I'm proud of what I said and how I conducted myself. I didn't (totally) lose my temper, I didn't punch her, I didn't yell and make a scene. But I did stand up for all of those children who couldn't defend themselves. I will never regret that.

Gym Moms

"I can bitch, I can bitch/ 'Cause I'm better than you/ It's the way that I move/ The things that I do." - "The Bitch is Back" by Elton John

Have you seen the Lifetime show "Dance Moms"? It is disturbing, maddening, and totally, 100% addictive. Instead of focusing entirely on the high-pressure performing world that these children are thrown into (like on TLC's "Toddlers and Tiaras"), the Lifetime hit focuses on the bickering, one-upping, sometimes manipulative mothers of the future "So You Think You Can Dance" powerhouses. Wow, it's obviously clear that I watch way too much TV!

Anyway, I have come across mothers like the Dance Moms at the gym where the girls I nanny for do gymnastics. They are the Gym Moms! Yesterday I was appalled by three things I heard.

1. "Good thing we are nothing like those dance moms on TV!" Oh really? I have routinely heard these women commenting negatively on the skills of some of the children, bad mouthing the other parents, and having dozens of self-centered conversations each afternoon. Sounds a lot like a certain TV show that they can't seem to realize mirrors their lives to a tee. Hmm...

2. "I just bought this shirt yesterday at Target. That store is as good as it gets." The others all agreed enthusiastically. I guess these women have never heard of Neiman Marcus or Bloomingdales.

3. "The nanny was supposed to take Ava to the dentist yesterday, but she called in sick. Can you believe she would get the stomach flu like that? It messed up my whole day." It took all of the self-control I had not to turn around and give these women a piece of my mind. If I hadn't had the seven-year-old sitting next to me, I'm sure I would have told them a little something like this: "Between throwing up and feeling like she was going to die at any second, your nanny, who probably caught the stomach flu from taking care of your kids by the way, was probably doing a little happy dance thinking about how much she messed up your day, because after all, the world does revolve around you." It was probably a good thing I had to keep my mouth shut, huh?

And those three conversations were not unusual in the slightest. Move over Dance Moms, the Gym Moms could make you hide under your chairs and cry. Can you still cry if you've had massive amounts of Botox? I'll have to do some research on that one.