I made a bad parenting call yesterday. I got mad and stayed mad over something that I could’ve let slide had I not been so tired/hungry/worried over the fate of Downton Abby.
We all know that the people we hang out with influence how we behave. And since I tend to spend a great deal of time with people under 4 feet tall, it seems that I am starting to act like them. This has its uses – I now actually feel unparalleled joy when I fly a paper airplane down the stairs so that it curves perfectly and lands on top of the coffee table. But I have also adopted some less admirable reactions, such as the all-consuming rage I feel when someone accidently TOUCHES MY KNEE! (And it wasn’t an accident! It was on purpose!! I know it was because he always does that to me and you never do anything about it!!!).
Yes, on occasion I lose objectivity and forget to act like the adult in the room. And while I am so often grateful that the only witnesses to my bad behavior are under ten years old, I sometimes wish there were others present to critique my parenting performance. A ‘how’s my driving?’ for the childrearing set.
And so I got to thinking… What if we had an external parenting review board made up of objective experts who could dissect our parent/child interactions in the moment? They could point out what we had done well, and tell us how to change in the event that we had spent the afternoon screaming ‘Mommy is not a tissue!’ at bewildered children who are shocked by this new reality.
Instead of leaving us to our own devices, the board will coach us from the sidelines. They’ll blow the whistle at the first sign of bad parenting, calm us down, refocus us with a pep talk, a snickers bar, some reassurance that Downton will persevere, and send us back in to finish strong. This on the job supervision, free from judgment and born of love would lead us to become the stellar, unflappable parents that we would already be had we just 8 more hours of sleep a night.
But where are these tolerant, kind hearted parenting board members to be found? Who can know the hearts and minds of parents and children alike, adjusting for the amorphous and fluctuating factors of temperament, hunger, frustration, and hours of exposure to Barney? Who can be trusted to bear witness to our most vulnerable family moments and help us see through to our most perfect selves?
It could be the whine intoxication talking (please note that that is not a typo) but this is how I envision it:
Over the course of the day parents and children may disagree about a wide range of issues, but most of them are cookies. Who better than the Cookie Monster himself to assess whether or not we have been fair in the distribution of cookies per child per day? He empathizes with the child’s certainty that the world will end should another cookie not be shoved down his throat immediately. He is the patron saint of those who lack impulse control and a respected member of the panel.
Next is a fellow who makes up for in energy what he lacks in elocution. Animal illustrates the sweet release of the meltdown that parents desperately fear and children use to their advantage because they are evil and conniving. There is an Animal lurking in all of us and thus we turn to him to mediate amidst chaos.
Gonzo’s sometimes impish, sometimes sensitive nature makes him an ideal board associate. He can truly relate to a parent’s desire to keep a child safe (note his tender care of the chickens) and a child’s desire to be shot out of a cannon (note his being shot of out a cannon). Gonzo can help us find common ground with our young cannon fodder and facilitate tolerance between these often opposing outlooks.
Misunderstandings and communication breakdowns are rampant between the generations. When I say ‘stop pretending to be a ninja and go to sleep’ and my children hear ‘please test how well the ceiling fan is welded to the ceiling’ I get upset, children get duct taped to their beds, and nobody wins. Enter the chronically misunderstood Swedish Chef to teach us that when words fail, there are other techniques that can convey our message. Body language, some singsongy gibberish, and some old fashion crazy might be just what we need to make ourselves understood.
My children and I will be invincible under the guidance of my methodically vetted Muppet board. They are bizarre and eclectic enough to help us navigate the rough waters of motherhood, yet imaginary enough that I need not worry about bumping into them at the grocery store now that they have observed my parenting flaws firsthand. And in a gesture of sharing and goodwill I encourage you to contact the External Parenting Advisory Board too. All it takes is a little creativity, a dash of psychosis, and a hearty supply of cookies. With a little help from my friends, Cookie Monster, Animal, Gonzo, and the Swedish Chef, parenting nirvana need not be as elusive as the rainbow connection.
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