I’d like to think all parents have these moments.

Stepparents have them, too, and in a way that smacks you across the face and makes you want to crawl in bed and die.

Lemme splain.

About, oh, I dunno, a year or so ago, I bought some bubbles.  One of the staff at Tony’s daycare mentioned how easy it was to transfix a baby with bubbles, so I bought your typical $1 bubbles.  We got home from the store, and I cracked open the bottle.  I fished out the wand, brought it up to my lips, and Jack bellowed,

“NO BUBBLES IN THIS HOUSE.  BUBBLES ARE FOR OUTSIDE PLAY ONLY.”

Yes, those were MY words.

I’ve been a stepparent to Jack for many years now, and let’s face it, I had NO CLUE what I was doing when I started.  In fact, I emailed someone the other day a How-To on being a stepparent with what I believe to be very sage advice, along with the caveat of “If I had written this two years ago, it’d be vastly different .. and it will be vastly different two years from now.”  It’s fluid and dynamic, that parenting thing.

I thought Jack needed rules and boundaries and structure when he was younger.. and I still stand by most of that .. but something I felt very strongly about was manners, etiquette, and a respect for property.  As such, apparently, I strictly enforced that bubbles are for OUTSIDE only.  They might stain.

And I didn’t remember that.  Good thing I didn’t have to; my parrot remembered for me.

I was also reminded the other day of another BUBBLES moment.  Tony woke up groggy from a nap, one that had come as a crash landing and hadn’t lasted long enough, apparently.  As Bryan teased and poked him, I got increasingly angry.  “He just needs to wake up a bit,” I’d whine, and realized I was defending Tony’s grouchy behavior.  I distinctly remembered, with a start, an EXACT instance where Jack had the same behavior and I thought, “We all wake up, just wake up and don’t be grouchy.”

Everyone told me “it’ll be different with your own child”, and they were right.  But in such a way that there are SO MANY times that I feel I owe Jack a do-over.

I am a cryer.

I used not to be.  In fact, I could count on one hand the things that made me cry: Pixar, animals, and third-world poverty.  That was it.  Nothing else even MOVED me.

Then I had a baby.

Suddenly, I am a CRYER OF ALL THINGS.  Like, seriously.  It’s ridiculous.

This morning, I was treating myself to a Starbucks run (although it was the cheapest coffee trick in the world: order a misto instead of a latte and save yourself $$ AND calories).  I ordered at the speaker, and while waiting to get to the window for pick-up, an On-Star commercial came on.  A woman called On-Star because her son was having a seizure.

“Baby, look at ME,” the mother coaxed.  “LOOK AT MOMMA,” the mother begged.

“Ma’am, just let your son seize,” coached the On-Star rep.  “Turn him on his side if he starts coughing.”

And I?  Made it to the window a blubbering mess.  Sobbing.  The poor window attendant didn’t know what to say.  “On-Star,” I sobbed.  “Her son was seizing.”  The Starbucks lady just nodded and handed me my drink.

“Have a nice day,” she said, cautiously.

****

I took Tony to the park last weekend.

It should be noted that I have a firm agreement with gravity that strictly prohibits any of the following: carousels, skates of any kind, roller coasters, and slides.  Yes, slides.  I wouldn’t get on one until I was, like, eleven and even then I had a mental breakdown at the top.  I was a worrier.

This, however, was my child.  Nothing could stop him.  It’s hard to let go of my issues and let my child roam without The Fear.  But I know it’s the right thing to do.

****

Last night, we took the boys to a Chick-Fil-A with an indoor play area. We had a great tease of spring this weekend, with highs almost in the 70s, but now we’re suffering back through snow flurries. Which a child who is now “SIDE” obsessed doesn’t understand. “SIDE?” he asks all the time now. “PARK?!”

We hadn’t anticipated being the one of a hundred families with this same idea, and the HUGE, three-story play area was FILLED with crazed children.

Jack, being the amazing big brother he is, calmly held Tony’s hand. He lifted Tony through I don’t know how many tubes and steps that Tony is just not big enough to tackle on his own yet. He coaxed him into the higher levels, encouraging Tony to look down and wave to us from whatever monstrous height they were at. The slide proved to be too much for Tony to take on, so Jack patiently got him all the way back down, never losing patience or getting frustrated that he wasn’t free to play.

I wasn’t a cryer before.

But I’m always amazed at what causes my heart to overflow now.

Reasons to do this meme:

1) It’s Monday.

2) We get our program’s budget news today, so I imagine I’ll be weeping in a fetal position for most of the afternoon.

3) It’s from Miss Zoot, and I was TOTALLY talking about her last night. (I’m totally emailing you, Kim!)

4) Because I want to.

1. Which expensive electronic device do you most often let your older children abuse or your baby drool on?
   IPHONE.  My child has an entire page of apps entirely for him on my phone, and he can operate most of them without any assistance from me.  And before you judge me.. or, really, even after you do because I don’t care.. that page of apps has gotten me through many meals and rehearsals. 
2. How many take-out restaurant numbers do you have programmed into your phone?
   I had to check because I wasn’t sure, but only three: Steak-Out, Another Broken Egg, and Thai Garden. 
3. How many hours of television do you so totally not let your kids watch a week?
   When Tony’s home, the tv’s usually on, but he rarely sits and focuses or really watches it.  So a week’s average would be around an hour a day.  Jack watches a little more, but he also plays Wii.. do we count that as tv? 
4. Do you think people who say “we don’t watch television” at play dates but really mean “we just watch DVDs” are lying liars from Liarville?
   I think the only people who can truly say “we don’t watch television” are the ones who do not physically own a tv in their house.  And there are people like that.  I don’t know about the lying or whatnot, but I know that I tend to kind of snort when parents say that. 
5. How many miles have you driven with your child and not one device of electronic entertainment in a single car trip?
   Jack typically plays a handheld Nintendo of some type when we go somewhere, but he only does so for maybe half an hour before he gets bored.  Tony never does anything other than sing and chat.  We don’t have a DVD player in the car. 
6. What’s your record for calls to the pediatrician or Ask-a-Nurse in a single day?
   One.  I hate the phone more than anything else in the entire world so I’d rather just visit a doc-in-the-box if I was worried about the health of my b aby. 
7. What’s the sexiest thing your partner could text you after a hard day?
   “I’ve arranged for a sitter.. let’s go eat and relax.” 
8. What’s your favorite iPad joke?
   Really, is there anything more fubared than the actual gadget? 
9. What’s the dumbest parenting tool, gear, gadget or device you ever bought?
   I love her and it was really a cool thing, but my mother bought this pacifier sanitizer thing for me that sprayed the pacifier with Listerine and then collected the spray into a resevoir.  I mean, sure, it’s cleaner than me cleaning it off in my own mouth (as I tended to do), but I never had it on me and it was kind of big and .. I’m just too lazy. 
10. How many years will it take for your child to become more tech-savvy than you?
    Jack constantly amazes me with this.  We don’t have long before he outsmarts us.. if he doesn’t already.  And Tony figured out the TiVo remote about three months ago.. he can actually find the right Blue’s Clues episodes without any assistance from us (he’s solely in the Joe camp).  I imagine we’ll be locked in our house before too long.