My inner child

I thought this blog needed a little levity, so I'm reverting to my inner child on this one. I wrote the poem below, "Three cheers for tears!" earlier tonight, after The Toddler had a series of crying fits that left Mommy and Daddy wanting to cry themselves. You will undoubtedly be able to tell that I've been overdosing on Dr. Seuss lately, too.

Three cheers for tears!

My, oh, my, how that baby cries.

Like a waterfall, tears fall from his eyes.

I know I should not pry.

But I must know why.

Why, oh, why does that baby cry?

Sit down and I’ll tell you why.

I’ll tell you why that baby cries.

But first you must keep your word.

And not repeat what you’ve heard.

Not even to a little bird.

This is just between you and me.

But those tears you see are a magic key.

They take you places you never thought you’d see.

All you have to do is hop in a canoe.

And float on those tears, from Kalamazoo to Malibu, from Honolulu to Peru.

No, it would not be wise to dry those eyes.

Now that I have your ear, know that there’s nothing to fear.

It’s only a tear, my dear.

So let’s hear it for tears.

Three cheers for tears!

Stepping into my shoes

This blog, as anyone who regularly reads it knows, contains several of my musings on fatherhood after 40. When I write these anecdotes about The Toddler, I try, as best I can, to step into his boys' size 6 shoes. The problem is that a men's size 9 foot does not fit into a boys' size 6 shoe.

There are literally tons of books claiming to know what's best for our kids. But these so-called experts can't possibly know what's really going on in the mind of a toddler. And if you don't know what's going on in those little heads, how can you really know what's best for them?

Now we even have reality-based TV shows like Supernanny and Nanny 911 where desperate parents can go to tame their wild beasts. Jo Frost (aka Supernanny) even has a book out now in which she dispenses more of her child-rearing advice, for those, like The Toddler's Mommy, who just can't get enough of her on TV.

But are these reality nanny shows real? Almost certainly not. Anyone who claims to have all the answers almost certainly doesn't. And any story arc that always ends up happily is almost certainly Hollywood fiction. The show that I'd like to see is the one that goes back six months later and sees what these families look like after the Supernanny rides off in her little car into the sunset.

I'm not saying that there aren't lessons that can be learned from parenting how-to books or even from TV nannies; I'm just saying that life isn't as simple as they make it out to be.

The reality is that kids aren't that simple. So much is going on in those little heads, things that we as adults have no ability to grasp. We learn from them as they learn from us. It's not a one-way street. And it shouldn't be. It's not like we have all the answers.

No, the truth is, parents have few answers. And perhaps that's for the best. Because we don't want them just filling our shoes. We want them to grow into their own.

Son of like father, like son

My journal entry Like father, like son got me thinking more about how alike or how different I am from The Toddler. Not so much now, but when I was The Toddler. Did I act like he did when I was his age? Did I look like him when I was his age?

Of course my memories of toddlerdom were conveniently erased by my brain. I'm not really sure when I actually began to retain memories of my childhood, but it was probably somewhere around kindergarten. The pre-K period is pretty much a clean slate. 

A toddler's inability to retain memory gives parents what amounts to a four- to five-year pass in the history books. All the mistakes they made are wiped clean from the toddler's memory bank. (Perhaps this phenomenon might explain the last presidential election as well. It's as good a theory as any, I suppose.)

So when we reach adulthood, where do we go to bring back those lost memories? We go, of course, to pictures. Now this is where parents today are making a huge mistake. Everything that kids do today is recorded, either by photographs, videotape or digital imagery. Our kids eventually will grow up and review these recorded histories and, inevitably, will come to resent if not vilify us for doing the things that parents do to kids, like dressing them up in bumblebee outfits.

Most of our parents were cunning enough to not leave many clues from our toddler years behind. My parents left one photo album of my lost years. It is filled with fading, mostly black-and-white images of these early formative years. I'm fortunate to even have that. My parents didn't make the same mistake twice. My younger sister's album is empty. Really, it is.

So it was into this photo album that I began to dig for answers. Were there pieces of me at that early age that I can now see in my son? Below are some answers, in photographic form. I'll let you be the judge. The black-and-white photos are obviously me.

     

Like father, like son

Sometimes watching your child grow is like looking in a mirror. You start to see yourself in that little body -- and it can be the coolest thing in the world. Or the scariest.

When a baby is born, everyone -- relatives, friends, complete strangers -- wants a glimpse of the little creature. And you see their eyes, as they peek in on tiny Yoda, glance occasionally in the direction of the parents. You know what's coming, don't you? Of course you do.  He's got Mommy's eyes. Or he's got Daddy's oversized nose. Now I know my vision isn't what it used to be, but I just don't see these things. Newborns, to me, barely look human.
The Newborn
Yoda

By the time those babies become toddlers, you do start to see some of these things. For instance, like me, my son has a cowlick -- a projecting tuft of hair on the head that grows in a different direction from the rest of the hair and just will not lie flat. Most likely he will have to live with this inherited trait all his life. And if he's anything like me, he will curse it each and every one of those days, because no matter how many hair products he tries, that little tuft of hair will never cooperate.

But there are more than just physical characteristics that we share. For better or worse (usually worse), I'm starting to see The Toddler display many of the mannerisms and behaviors that I thought I owned the rights to.

Peanuts danceFor instance, The Toddler seems to have inherited some of his father's better dance moves. When he first was learning to dance, I was concerned. He did this thing where both of his arms were outstretched behind him with palms up and looked not unlike a Peanuts cartoon character. At stage two he had a frenzied, spinning Tazmanian devil dance. That had me a bit scared. But at stage three, around 19 months, he really advanced. From a squat position, much like a midget sumo wrestler, with arms facing forward and wrists clenched, he moves his torso from side to side. You can tell he's starting to really feel the music, just like his father. Now if only he could work on that overbite.

The Toddler also has picked up his father's unflattering habit of whining and moaning whenever things don't go exactly as he planned. He also cries at the sight of a doctor, just like his father.

But I can most see The Toddler in me when he strikes a Sunday afternoon pose with a bag of Cheetos cradled in his arms. As a father, I couldn't be more proud.
    Say, "Cheese!"(I'm sad to say that after seeing the photo below, Mommy banned Daddy from providing The Toddler with Cheetos ever again. Hopefully, for The Toddler's sake, Mommy will show mercy and lift this prohibition. Just look at the joy on that cheesy face.)

Snippet's in the bud

You can, apparently, fool a parent an infinite number of times.  That's why the shame is always on the parent.  Your toddler always conveys in clear, quite audible, cries and moans when he does not like the situation that you, the parent, have placed him in.  Yet that message never seems to really get through to the parent.  It's almost as if there's a disconnect in our brain when it comes to what we think our toddler should like and what he is telling us he likes or dislikes.  So we keep putting that toddler in the same situation, thinking that the toddler will get it this time and the result will be different.  Almost universally it isn't.

Case in point: Yesterday, we ventured to Northbrook Court for The Toddler's second professional haircut, at Snippet's Mini-Cuts.  Versions of the kid-friendly hair salon are sprouting up everywhere, it seems, and it's easy to see why. 

For most of us, at least most of us who are carriers of the Y chromosome, the haircut is viewed as a tedious, if not painful task only slightly less objectionable than having teeth pulled.

As a full-fledged carrier of the Y chromosome, I can say that my negative thoughts about haircuts started at an early age.  After all, few things, other than perhaps the dentist, are more terrifying for a child than being plopped on a barber chair, strangled with a cape, and attacked by a clipper-wielding stranger.

So why not attempt to make the haircut a more pleasant, comfortable experience for a child? That's what Snippet's and its kin try to do, complete with novelty car and animal stations and video monitors featuring current children's videos.

As Snippet's says on its website, its salons "are uniquely designed to capture a child's imagination and to welcome them into a wonderland where they feel safe and secure when they are approached for services."  This sounds like a dreamland, and the salons do look pleasing, at least to my adult eye.

But, as any parent knows, a child's dream world can turn into night terrors at any time.  That's what happened the first time we took The Toddler for his professional haircut.  Wonderland was no tea party.

So, of course, as parents, we had the temerity to do it all over again, thinking that things couldn't go worse.  They did -- go worse, that is, which only means that The Parents will be dragging The Toddler, kicking and screaming, up to Northbrook Court again in another two months.  The third time has got to be the charm, right?

In defense of Snippet's, I must say that, under challenging circumstances, their stylists do an incredible job.  The Toddler has somehow come out of his two professional haircuts unscarred (at least physically if not emotionally) and with a pretty good haircut.  That's enough to keep us coming back.

Here is the essay I wrote after The Toddler's first haircut experience:

Snippet's in the bud

The blow-by-blow account of The Toddler's day (okay, 5 minutes) in the barber chair.

The Toddler enters Northbrook Court to the red carpet treatment.  Trumpets are blaring. Confetti is falling. 

Oh, sorry, I'm letting my rather vivid imagination get the better of me.  So there were no trumpets.  And there was no confetti.  But The Toddler did seem to be in an unusually good mood, so much so that he didn't even fight getting into his stroller.  We're off to a promising start.

We arrive at the door of Snippets promptly at 10:30 a.m.  Right on time.  Things are still going good. 

I unleash The Toddler from the stroller, and he immediately runs to the firetruck chair.  This is good.  It's the one open seat, and The Toddler seems to be enchanted by it.  He's spinning the wheels, making sure that it's ready to go just in case a real fire does break out.  I'm thinking this is going to be a breeze.  All of my pre-Snippet's wariness was for naught.

But then a boulder is thrown in the road.  The Toddler's not getting the firetruck.  He's getting the racecar.  So I pick him up and try to place him in the racecar.  It's got a steering wheel.  Surely he'll like that.  But I sense that something is just not right in ToddlerLand.  He's apprehensive and has to be forced into the car. 

Then the stylist turns on the video.  (Snippet's offers a first-time haircut package that includes a videotaping of the experience for $25; the cost of a regular cut without the package is $18). The Toddler goes into deer-in-the-headlights mode, as if he's got a severe case of camera shyness.  Now this isn't all bad, he's just sitting there frozen while the stylist is busy snipping away.  The Toddler doesn't even seem to realize what's going on on top of his head.  He's not happy, but he's not per se unhappy, either.  I'm okay with that.

But then the stylist, who has the fingers of Edward Scissorhands but the personality of Al Gore, asks me to hold his chin.  This is for The Toddler's safety as she cuts around his ears. The Toddler doesn't like having his chin held, and he REALLY doesn't like having the hair cut around his ears.  He's clearly petrified now and it gets worse when she asks me to then hold down his arms and begins her cleanup work with the electric trimmer.  The Toddler is crying and now clearly unhappy with this experience. 

But then it is suddenly all over.  The video camera is turned off.  Mommy rips The Toddler from the chair and out of the store where she finds my friend The Lone Ranger and his two kids who have just gotten off the escalator.  I pay the $25 and give a $5 tip to Al.  In return I'm given a bag with the videotape of The Toddler's first haircut and a snippet of hair that will be used if we ever decide to genetically reproduce him.

The whole process took no more than five minutes, which, if my calculations are correct, comes to a $300-an-hour haircut.  If nothing else, they are efficient. 

And The Toddler came out of it perhaps mentally scarred but not physically scarred, which is in some ways the most miraculous achievement of all.

The haircut itself is, all things considered, pretty good.  Probably better than the haircuts I get for $10.95 at Bo-Rics, which also take about 5 minutes but with only half the fussing and crying.

If you don't believe my story, well, it's all on videotape, which I'm sure The Toddler will cherish for a lifetime (or use as reason to sue his parents for causing undue emotional trauma to a toddler).