ANYWAY, we've moved and are relatively settled. Life has attained some sense of normalcy which means it's about time for something to go wrong. So, I'll just sit here and wait until then. Just kidding. I'll sit here and wait and drink my whiskey with diet Mountain Dew (because when you're drinking who needs all those empty soda calories). Besides, I'm never going to be able to write a blog for a living. I have neither the time nor ability. Instead I'll continue pooping out these little nuggets of wisdom like a trail of breadcrumbs through the maze of parenting and life. Note my sacrifice.
Car seats: essential for raising your child in modern America and a sore spot in the parent-child relationship. Yes, safety and all of that. Blah blah blah, I get it, but also the tantrums and screaming. These little space-aged polypropylene wonders are great for preventing your child's death in a car accident, and that is not to be dismissed, but they are also a disturbingly common scene for some of the greatest meltdowns in child-rearing history. You have before you but a smattering of the experiences in which I have played some roll first hand. Godspeed.
The Boiling Lava Feint
The Problem: In this scenario, your child will act as if the mere movement of its person in a direction approximating the general location of their car seat will scorch their delicate smooth skin like a red hot nickel ball through memory foam. It is not uncommon to experience this phenomenon at the mere mention of a car seat or going anywhere. If you're child is a telepath with a voodoo-like sense of something about to happen they'll just creepily bring their magic telepathy hand to their temple like Professor-X and glimpse that thought right out of your fucking skull.
The Solution: I don't know, planned ignoring? I think that's a concept I learned somewhere along the way. I grew up with a father whose go-to disciplinary technique was "planned ignoring". As we got older he imparted said wisdom to us with the sage retort, "Just ignore it." The only thing I ever heard when he said that was my blood boiling. But I digress. I've simply learned to walk around with Magneto's helmet on 24/7. I have raging back issues from trying to sleep in that thing, but at least my child can no longer telepathically sense the car seat a' comin'.
The Plank of Protest
The Problem: If you were unaware, children come pre-programmed for planking maneuvers. Tens of thousands of years of evolutionary development has seen fit that upright walking comes with the development of musculature strong enough to support said upright walking. Now, I have no idea if that's how locomotion actually works or why it works the way it does, but I am relatively sure that your child has gone rigor mortis stiff when attempting to be placed in their car seat. In accomplishing this task they have become the third side of one of the world's strongest shapes, the dreaded triangle.
The Solution: Tickling, and hopefully your child reacts to actual tickling. There's no easier way to release the tension in your child's core than by tickling. Apparently I'm not the greatest tickler. Kelly? Oh totally. Adryn laughs and laughs and laughs with her when it comes to the tickling. Why? No fucking clue. I literally do the same things, in the same places, with the same faces and sounds and I get a pity giggle followed by an emphatic, "More, mommy."
The Twist and Shout
The Problem: No, it's not 1962 and your child is not a member of the Isley Brothers, but 9 out of 10 babies spring forth from the uterus able to perfectly mimic this classic dance craze. I'm not even sure it was a dance craze but I'm a historical revisionist so I make it a point to not let things like primary source material and facts get in the way of my writing. Regardless, The ole' twist and shout maneuver, while loud and somewhat ridiculous, can at least provide some moments of entertainment as it is not out of the realm of possibilities for your child to end up in compromising positions. Small victories folks, small victories. Plus, you know you're going to have to fill that senior open house scrapbook with something.
The Solution: So long as you can weather the battery to your auditory nerve, just let it happen. At some point you'll end up with a child head down, feet up, on the floor of your vehicle. Natural consequence is a great teacher in these semi-controlled moments; no chance for serious injury and all the possibility in the world for a great photo-op. Just let it come. Take a nice long pull off your flask while you wait and prepare your phone for a quick pic when things literally go south for your child. I live for these moments.
The Solution: So long as you can weather the battery to your auditory nerve, just let it happen. At some point you'll end up with a child head down, feet up, on the floor of your vehicle. Natural consequence is a great teacher in these semi-controlled moments; no chance for serious injury and all the possibility in the world for a great photo-op. Just let it come. Take a nice long pull off your flask while you wait and prepare your phone for a quick pic when things literally go south for your child. I live for these moments.
The Death Roll
The Problem: This antic passes into the realm of "quite possibly possessed" because it's silent. Eerily silent. And your child is able to summon some inexhaustible level of energy, most likely from the gates of Hell. Verbal protests are replaced by perfectly timed rolls that continue to confound the physical laws of the universe. Newton ain't got nothing on this shit.
The Solution: If you're trying to wait it out you've most likely been sitting in the same parking lot for the past three hours. Much like a frog dissection, you're looking for multiple points of ingress in order to plaster your child to the seat and find some way to clasp something...somewhere...for the love of Hades just let me clasp something. Clasped the wrong thing? Doesn't matter, your first task is to stop the rolling. Child's arm is now somehow pinned to their crotch? Hopefully that will give you some leverage. You can fix it once the rolling has stopped.
The Solution: If you're trying to wait it out you've most likely been sitting in the same parking lot for the past three hours. Much like a frog dissection, you're looking for multiple points of ingress in order to plaster your child to the seat and find some way to clasp something...somewhere...for the love of Hades just let me clasp something. Clasped the wrong thing? Doesn't matter, your first task is to stop the rolling. Child's arm is now somehow pinned to their crotch? Hopefully that will give you some leverage. You can fix it once the rolling has stopped.
The Bloody Murder
The Problem: Pure, unadulterated, screaming. For the aurally sensitive among us, this may be the end, and mind you this is no joke. Some kids have the pipes to rend your ear drums in two and others, like mine, have a stubborn streak born of two parents' genetics honed over generations of evolution. They could scream cry for days if they so choose.
The Solution: Ear plugs are your only hope. Yes your ears are still bleeding even with that heavenly dampening of sound, but you can at least get on with your day. Hopefully your car trip is short otherwise you're also going to need a morphine drip. Yes, even with the ear plugs. Yes, even though I called that a solution. Listen, you have to think of contingencies here. Who knows how long this scream cry can last. You might have just ruined the rest of your day, possibly week. Your in the tall grass now, aimlessly wandering through the dark without a flashlight and finding you've become a veritable smorgasbord for hundreds of ticks. Months later, when you emerge from your wanderings you'll find yourself gibbering nonsense sitting in your doctor's office being diagnosed with Lyme Disease. Just hope those antibiotics take care of it, otherwise you're fucked.
You might be thinking to yourself, "geeze Jake, the last one escalated quickly." It didn't, trust me. That one escalated exactly how these situations do. Listen, I've heard descriptions of the contraptions people used to use in their vehicles to keep their children safe (we're literally talking about suspension cables here) and if you're like me, sometimes you have to put your money on the long game. Cars have only been in any widespread use for like, a hundred years. Car seats for kids only a fraction of that time. I'm guessing at some point in the near future some scientist in their science lab will develop a super-material that you can just spray on your child and throw them unceremoniously into the cab of your vehicle without worry. Until then, have your ear plugs handy and don't forget to get tested for Lyme Disease. Nobody wants to deal with that shit.
