She was young, beautiful and had captured my heart at birth but it didn’t mean that she wasn’t capable of making me crazy.
My baby girl and I were spending some daddy/daughter time together at the mall when I felt a twinge and a rumble in my stomach and I knew that it wouldn’t be long before nature would ask insist I attend a meeting inside the closest facility.
We had just arrived at the play area and she was an almost five-year-old on a mission to suck the marrow out of life right there. She had told me she was going to climb on everything and run, jump and play because it is what she loves to do.
Things were beginning to look grim. It was the middle of the day and I was the only father there and the moms weren’t entirely certain what to make of me.
I looked around to see if I knew any other parents because I knew that rumble meant it wouldn’t be long before the situation would get um…ugly. Damn, I didn’t know anyone so there would be no asking for help.
That burrito had tasted great going down but I just knew that it is departure was going to be nightmarish and that it was going to create the sort of clean up where Cottonelle would have been a welcome help.
But the malls aren’t equipped that way and I didn’t see any friendly Brits wandering around talking to people about it.
Since I couldn’t see a clever way of asking the moms for assistance I knew I had to take action so I walked over to my daughter and told her it was time to leave.
She told me she wasn’t ready and that she hadn’t had enough time to play. I said I was sorry and explained we had to get going and instantly saw this was not going to go well. Angry females are not always easy to deal with regardless of their age, but the under five set can be particularly difficult.
Rational thought isn’t a big part of their daily routine. I told her I had to go to the bathroom and she said go.
I said I couldn’t leave her alone and she said she would be fine. She told me she wanted five minutes but I knew that could mean hours to her so I gave her the stern dad look and said it wasn’t up for negotiation.
And then I remembered how I ignored her nap time because I figured it would be a treat for her to play longer and that she would sleep in the car anyway. They say people plan and G-d laughs and man I am certain he was laughing then.
My decision to let her slip into overtired land because she would sleep in the car had just smacked me in the ass. It wouldn’t be as physically irritating as what was coming but getting her out of the mall on a timely basis was about to become an issue.
So I picked her up, grabbed her shoes and started speed walking towards the other side of the mall where we would have to take the escalator up three flights, walk across the parking lot, get strapped in and then drive 25 minutes to the local relief center, our home.
Assuming she didn’t find a way to slow me down, the parking lot wasn’t jammed and there wasn’t any traffic I figured it would be ok.
But we live during a time when adults can’t carry a screaming child through the mall without people paying lots of attention. Under normal circumstances I am grateful and appreciative for the attention.
The “it takes a village” to raise a child bit is good and it is nice to see other parents try to help protect our children by making sure the man carrying the screaming child is indeed their father.
But when you are in a rush to answer the call of nature it is less appreciated and people don’t respond well when you tell them to get out of the way or you will unleash the sort of biological attack upon them that will make skunks hide in shame.
And it was during those moments that I thanked G-d for having a deep voice and a glare that makes men move out of my way because those moms made way so that I could make like Moses moving through the Red Sea.
Somewhere in the midst of all the chaos my daughter started singing, ‘Move It, Move it’ the song from Madagascar and we managed to get to the car and somehow got home just in time.
Now if only I would have had those Cottonelle wipes waiting for me at home it really would have been a happy ending from top to my bottom.
(Disclosure: I was not paid a million bucks for this post but I was compensated by Cottonelle.)
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