Several years ago I watched in horror as a respectable looking woman crossed 6th Street with four toddlers all on leashes. It was like something out of a horror film and I gasped, giggled, and then gasped again.
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Babies on leashes always seemed so wrong. Soooosososo wrong. It seemed so tacky. So lazy! So... ick! Bleh! Yuck! I was the first person to roll my eyes at Six Flags when I spotted fanny-packed mothers with their toddlers on Six Flag brand leashes. I judged mothers left and right and wondered how they slept at night, knowing they leashed their kids.
"They're not dogs. They're babies," I thought. "Sheesh."
That was before I was the mother of a wandering one-year-old. Before my shy little boy turned into a brave and disobedient little explorer with a mind all his own and no desire to impress me or entertain my rules.
He may stay close to me in familiar places but in new and dangerous ones, he's fearless and curious and wants nothing more than to run free. Far, far, away.
Today we had lunch at Olive Garden with my two favorite preggo's, Katrina and Michelle and Miss Grace.
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Grayson ate his lunch like a good little boy and then decided to play with his lunchable wrapper for the remainder of the lunch hour. He started whining to get out of his highchair and I new I had about 30 seconds before disaster struck. Meltdown City was heading our way. So, I gave him some fun little sugar wrapper thingys that were blue and pink. Way fun. He then proceeded to eat said sugar wrapper thingys with SUGAR STILL IN THEM, so we asked for the check.
We then ventured to Babies R Us to buy some necessities for Katrina. We had a little scare last night that Baby Paige was about to make her grand entrance and realized we still needed some important baby stuff.........you know like cute little polka dotted long sleeved onesies and sweet little burp cloths with butterflies and adorable little zippy pj's.......you get the idea. Important stuff.
Grayson wasn't really interested. At all. He started whining with that un-adorable nasaly whine so I thought to myself, "Hmmmmm, why don't I let him stretch his little legs for a bit. Big mistake. Huge. Not a second after unbuckling him from his stroller, he went running through the aisles , weaving in and out of strangers toward the little kiosk where you pick up the registries. I ran after him, screaming for him to slow down.
"Ahhhh!!! Wait up! Graaaaaaaaaaayson.."
I went sprinting after him, and pretty much spent the next hour, chasing him through the endless aisles of baby paraphanalia and carrying him kicking and screaming back to Katrina.
Tantrums persisted. I got very dehydrated trying to stop him from picking things up off the floor and putting them in his mouth. I picked him up. He wiggled back down. I gently placed him in the back of a shopping cart thinking, "Oooooh, he'll like that".....he didn't. It was a little slice of hell.
I forced him in his stroller where he kicked and screamed and reached out to passer-bys to be rescued and set free.
"Nope. Sorry, dude. You just lost your freedom privileges. You can't run away like that! You have to stay close."
Did I mention he was shoe-less? The boy
still refuses to wear shoes! So now I'm all hot and sweaty from chasing him around and
HE has grocery-store feet. Ugh! You know what I'm talking about....the nasty "black feet" you got as a child because you wouldn't wear shoes in the grocery store. No? Just me??? Maybe that's the one thing he got from me, his mom. I didn't like wearing shoes either.
Hmmmmmmm............
We eventually got everything we had came for and headed to the checkout.
On our way to the parking lot, we passed a woman with two toddlers on leashes. Grayson was still squirming in his stroller hysterical. I was on the verge of tears, exhausted and feeling like a total failure......I just didn't want Kat to think I was a bad mommy and that I was raising a hoodlum.
The woman with the leashes, on the other hand, was smiling away, chatting with her boys who were happily orbiting her, their arms stretched out like airplanes. Happy. They all were happy.
I envied the mother. For being able to have a comfortable afternoon at Babies R Us with her kids. It was obvious, she was doing something right. Me on the other hand? I was the "idiot". I was the "tacky" one.
I'll never judge a mother who leashes again.
On the contrary, I may even follow her lead and become a mommy who leashes, myself.
