by Jim Gaffigan
Sometimes my children will meet kids at the playground that are just jerks. I realize parents are supposed to let their children find their way in the world, and this includes dealing with bullies, but I can’t help myself. If I sense a kid is not being polite, I’ll interject myself into the situation.
“What’s going on here?”
The other kid always looks at me like, “Oh, he’s one of the crazy adults.”
Once my then three-year-old son, Jack, approached some seven-year-olds playing cards at the park and just watched them. One of the boys looked at my son and said, “Go away. You’re gross!” The other kids laughed.
I chimed in immediately. “No, you’re gross! You are the grossest gross grosser in the world!” The bully ran with tears in his eyes to his caregiver, who glared at me. I just smiled in victory. I realize I won’t always be there to defend my children, but if I can trim some of the jerky behavior out of their life, maybe they won’t do it to other kids. Of course, I am also getting revenge for my own victimization as a child. I was always hoping some pale giant would appear and rescue me from the bullies. Now I am that pale giant. You shall call me Thor.
God help you if one of your kids has to use the bathroom. Remember, they didn’t have to go at home, but (five minutes later) now they do. I’ve had some really difficult moments in my life, and using a New York City park bathroom with a three-year-old is up there. New York City park bathrooms feel like a crime scene. You are always expecting to see yellow police tape and a chalk-outlined body.
There’s usually water running and a homeless man giving himself a sponge bath. He always looks at you like you broke into his house. The only thing about the New York City park bathroom that is unlike a crime scene is that crime scenes will eventually be cleaned up. You may ask me why—if it is so scary and disgusting and I am not a serial killer—would I ever use a New York City park bathroom? Why not go home, or to a nearby restaurant, or just buy my kid a new outfit? Anything but use a New York City park bathroom? I use it because when a three-year-old tells you they have to use the bathroom, she does not mean in a couple of minutes. She means at that moment. Actually, before that moment. They always tell you at the last possible moment.
THREE-YEAR-OLD: I need to use the bathroom.
ADULT: Now?
THREE-YEAR-OLD: Almost done.
Wet pants, a bad fall, and a temper tantrum are all signals that it is now time to leave the park. If you thought leaving your house with little kids was impossible, now there is the other crisis of returning home that must be dealt with. You could spend ten hours at the park, and your announcement that it’s time to leave will always be greeted with whines of “Aw, man!” or “Five more minutes!” Of course, little kids never want to leave anywhere. They never say, “You know, I’m tired … let’s head home.” The more tired they get, the less they want to leave, and the more necessary it becomes for you to leave before the meltdowns start. To other people you are never leaving at the correct time with your children. You’re either looked at strangely for leaving early—“You’re going already?”—or you’re the irresponsible parent—“Your baby seems really tired. Like he needs to go to bed.” It’s amazing that people with kids ever go anywhere.
Suddenly, the only thing harder than leaving your house is returning to your house. Even though it’s an hour before dinner, you are forced to coax them out with the promise of ice cream, the methadone of leaving the park. It works. Now to clean them up and convince them to not tell Jeannie I got them ice-cream cones. They always promise to not say a word, but as we walk into the apartment, one will gleefully announce, “We had ice-cream cones!”
“Oh, really? Did Daddy have one, too?”
“Of course I didn’t.”
“No! Daddy had a hot fudge sundae.”
“What? I’m still going to eat dinner.”
Is It Too Soon to Start Dating Again?
I often view other parents the way I view other comedians. I have great respect for them, but I always assume they are crazy. I’m usually right. My other assumption about parents who have children who are of a similar age to mine is that we will have something in common. I’m usually wrong.
“How old is your kid?” is the “How about this weather?” of parental playground talk. I am at the park to spend time with my kid, not to chat with some stranger, but the casual chat becomes inevitable. Talking to a parent I don’t know at a playground can be an obstacle course. I try not to be too forward or too aloof. If the stranger parent is of the opposite sex, I don’t want the banter to be considered flirtatious or otherwise creepy. If the conversation gets too serious and we start talking about an election, religion, or soy milk, it can get really weird. Therefore it always goes back to the safe option: asking the age of the stranger’s child. Warning: Avoid guessing at a stranger parent’s child’s gender. You don’t want to be wrong.
ME: How old is he?
STRANGER MOM: She’s twenty-three years old!
ME: Wow, lots of hair.
If this awkward chat goes on too long, and your kids like each other, you may get sucked into phase two of the interaction with the stranger parent: the awkward playdate. Given that I have enough kids for a basketball team, I rarely seek out playdates. I understand that other parents want to arrange playdates, and of course my kids love them. Playdates are great for kids and most often incredibly uncomfortable for me, given my general dislike of human beings.
Many times, playdates with parents I don’t know feel like I am on a double date with my kid. My kid really likes his playdate friend and needs me as his wingman. He has set me up with someone I have no interest in hanging out with, but I’m doing him a solid. Suddenly I’ve traveled back in time to when I was single and trapped in that awful double-date scenario. I could always tell what my friends thought of me by the people they set me up with.
“What did you think of Lisa?”
“I’m not that desperate!”
For me, blind dates and first dates were nothing but awkwardness and discomfort. Playdates with a stranger parent are just déjà vu. “Oh, you guys don’t eat meat or food?” “Yeah, I guess the park is dirty.” “Tell me more about your job at the water filtration plant.” I am forced to engage in endless empty parent talk while my kids live it up. To be fair, it’s usually a great opportunity to discover that the only thing that I have in common with that parent is that we have a kid the same age.
Like a serial dater, I am spending time with strangers who I am not even on a first-name basis with. My phone is filled with numbers of people that I will probably never see again, and if I did, I would never know their real name: Milo’s dad, Luca’s mom, Silas’s dad, Oliver’s mom, that kid from Chelsea Piers’ gay dad.
Rarely do I meet a parent at a park or on a playdate that I develop a lifelong friendship with. Someone should really start an online service for playdate matchups. Parents could take a personality test to see if they are compatible with other kids’ parents before letting their kids become friends with kids with boring parents. It would narrow down the list of potential playdate partners’ parents and help you avoid the inevitable walk of shame home from a horrible playdate. I would totally sign up for that service. I’ve got an idea. Why don’t you start that business? You could call it “Playdates.com” or “ePlaydates.com.” You could make a killing! You’re welcome. Again. Don’t tell me you don’t have time. You’re just sitting around reading this brilliant book. Me? No, thanks. I have five kids. Plus I don’t like to work. Send me an e-mail when you have figured out your business plan. You can pay me then. I’ll take 80 percent. All right, all right, 79 percent. Hey! It was my idea! Fine. I’ll see you in court.
I’ll Be Your Tour Guide
When you have five kids, or even more than one kid, it can be difficult to give everyone the appropriate amount of attention. Therefore I strive to get some quality one-on-one time with each of them. I’ll proudly announce to Jeannie, “Michael [the one-year-old] and I are goin
g to have some ‘dad and son’ time together this afternoon.” Unfortunately, Jeannie will often say, “Fine, just don’t take him somewhere to eat.” I always think, “Then what are we supposed to do?” I mean, we could play catch, but he’s not that great at catching, so it feels more like playing throw. I’ll try to convince Jeannie that taking Michael to Katz’s Deli could be a memory that he cherishes. I imagine adult Michael saying, “I remember when I was little, my dad would take me to Katz’s for a pastrami sandwich. Occasionally, my dad would even let me have a bite. What a great dad I had.” Yet Jeannie always insists on no food. She has this weird thing about eating large meals between meals. I know, she’s a total weirdo, right? She also has this cockamamie notion that cured meat is not only bad for babies but bad for everyone! I call that “neglect.”
Eating healthy at Katz’s Deli. A tradition.
When you only have one of your children with you, you have many more options of places to go in New York City besides parks or playgrounds (the only logical places you can safely bring the whole group). Here are my assessments of these nonfood places that are good for one-on-one bonding with a kid.
Children’s Museums
I’m not really sure what makes a children’s museum a museum. I guess just the word museum. Children’s museums seem more like gathering places for toddlers to do fun activities while at the same time contracting a cold. I guess the idea is “Why have my kid ruin my house when he or she can go ruin this play area someone has named a museum?”
Regular Museums
NYC has some amazing regular museums that kids seem to enjoy. There’s the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Natural History, and a bunch of other ones I keep planning to take my children to. I know kids love these museums because whenever I take my kids to a NYC museum, they are way too crowded with other kids. Don’t ever go to a museum on a rainy Saturday. It’s like when the Walking Dead took over Atlanta. All right, I love The Walking Dead. Get used to me using it as a reference. Museums are a great cultural experience, and by that I mean a great opportunity for you to repeatedly tell your children not to touch things. I find museums incredibly exhausting, and by that I mean acting like you’re interested in some of those exhibits. “So this is a painting by another European painter of another unattractive European from the 1700s? Fascinating.” It seems like they were only painting the sad, ugly people back then. “Hey, you’re hard on the eyes, why don’t I paint your portrait?” To make matters worse, it’s hard to leave a museum, mostly because you can never find the exit. I’ve been in casinos that are easier to navigate.
My head looks pretty big in this picture, right?
The Zoo
Kids love the zoo. I’ve been lucky enough to take my kids to many zoos across the United States. What I’ve learned is that when children see animals in captivity, it makes them want ice cream.
ME: Hey, there’s a monkey!
KID: Can we get ice cream?
ME: Let’s see the polar bear.
KID: After that can we get ice cream?
ME: Are you enjoying the animals?
KID: Do they have animal-shaped ice cream?
Movies
My kids love going to movies, and I enjoy taking naps during those movies. Sure, I’m not thrilled to pay twelve dollars to take a nap, yet it always seems worth it. I’m not even concerned that I’m missing the film, because I know I’ll have another dozen times to see it at home when my kids watch it on Netflix or force me to buy it on iTunes for a thousand dollars.
Movie + Popcorn = Dad can nap
Brooklyn Bridge
The grandeur of walking across the Brooklyn Bridge is a great activity that attracts many New Yorkers and tourists. The views are amazing, and it’s free. Unfortunately, little kids are not big walkers. About one-third of the way across, they will start complaining that they want to “get off,” and you will have to explain to them that this is not an attractive option. You keep them motivated by the great pizza place on the other side, but be prepared to take a forty-dollar cab ride back to Manhattan.
New York Yankees Game
A dad has to take his boy to a baseball game, right? Well, I didn’t want my then three-year-old son, Jack, growing up and saying, “My dad never even took me to a baseball game.” So we went. I picked up Jack at nursery school and took the long subway ride up to Yankee Stadium. I proudly announced to Jack that we were going to the ballpark. He seemed excited. I seemed excited. We arrived early and entered the stadium. I bought him a ten-dollar hot dog and we went to look for our seats. Suddenly Jack belted out, “Aw man!” What? What happened? How could he be disappointed already? The game hadn’t even started! “Dad, this isn’t a park! You said we were going to the park!” We struggled through three innings and three more ten-dollar hot dogs before we got the hell out of there. Dad-and-son Yankee game, check!
I don’t mean to brag, but I dressed him that day.
Broadway Shows
Probably the most expensive thing you can do with your children in New York City is to take them to a Broadway show. We’ve seen The Lion King, Mary Poppins, Shrek, Annie (twice), and Beauty and the Beast (twice). The thing about having a bunch of kids is that you end up doing once-in-a-lifetime things more than once in a lifetime. Suddenly your new baby is four years old and that show is still on Broadway, and now she wants to see it. Sometimes the snacks at intermission cost you about as much as the overpriced ticket. I’ve yet to leave one of these shows and think, “Well that was worth the money.”
Statue of Liberty
I’d lived in New York twenty years and still hadn’t seen Lady Liberty in person. I’d had friends from out of town come and visit, and they would always want to take the ferry and see the statue. “No thanks, tell her I said hi.” When they came back, my out-of-town friends would rave about the experience. Once I had children, I knew I had to take them to see what all the fuss was about.
One Saturday morning, I had the brilliant idea that it would be a perfect day to visit the Statue of Liberty. I wrangled our then three kids down to the South Ferry Station, where the Statue of Liberty ferry departs. When we arrived, it became apparent that ten zillion other people had the same brilliant idea. Realizing that my children were too young to notice a difference, we took the Staten Island Ferry instead. My children were just thrilled to get on a boat. I pointed as we passed the statue. “There she is, Lady Liberty!” I was a hero.
Empire State Building
(See Statue of Liberty but replace Staten Island Ferry with a taxicab.)
Through all of my visits to these great places, I have learned that the one thing they all have in common that makes any of them worthwhile is that you are there with your kid spending quality time. That’s the most important thing: Quality time. The only other thing that could top the experience is quality time and a big pastrami sandwich. That would be quality quality time.
Pale Force
If you have no idea what I look like, I am a very pale person. My photo on the book cover was retouched to make the glare from my skin easier on your eyes. Hey, the publisher wanted to sell books. Trust me, I am a very pale person. No, I’m paler than that. Yes, that pale. Even when I look in the mirror, I think, “Wow, I’m pale!” I’ve never tanned. Growing up, I hated being pale. I was the whitest kid in an all-white community. Ironically, in a way I was the minority. As a kid, I was called “Whitey,” “Casper,” and “Albino.” Other kids would ask, “Why are you sooooo pale?” I realize this is a minor form of bullying compared to what some have gone through, but to the ten-year-old me it was brutal. I felt like an outcast. I was the pale kid. I sometimes think that in addition to the influence of my father, I pursued being funny just to add an adjective before “pale.” I would be the funny pale kid. So when I was asked, “Why is your hair sooooo white?” I’d respond, “Because my father is a Q-tip.” It got a laugh. It still hurt, but the laugh made it more bearable. Eventually I embraced my paleness. I even learned to laugh at my paleness. N
ow imagine five miniature versions of me, but not as dark skinned. During the summer, my children need sunscreen applied to them every ten minutes or they will die. I feel like I’m raising vampires. “Don’t open the fridge, you’ll kill yourself!”
Prior to having children, I never went outside. Well, I never went outside to enjoy the outdoors. I guess I’m what you would consider indoorsy. I didn’t even know what a long-sleeve sun shirt was or how humiliating it is to wear one. Now I’m the proud owner of two long-sleeve sun shirts. One for formal swimming pools and one for casual swimming pools. Let me tell you, there is no boost to the ego quite like putting sunscreen on the top of your balding head, but I think swimming in a pool in a long-sleeve sun shirt is up there. Wearing a long-sleeve sun shirt in a swimming pool makes it impossible to not look like a moron. People always seem to look at me like I fell in.
“Is that guy just swimming in his clothes?”
“That’s the worst suicide attempt I’ve ever seen.”
I suppose our family paleness is entertaining to the outside world, but it adds another thick, white layer of difficulty to parenting that most people don’t consider: sunscreen. Whoever decided that the protective goo that pale people need to slather liberally on their skin should be white and actually make them look paler is just cruel. But that’s only the first problem with sunscreen. To fully grasp the commitment that sunscreen demands from me, consider the following. I hope this will be an easy book to read. If you wanted to, I suppose you could read this book in a few hours. That is roughly the time it takes to properly apply sunscreen to one of my children. Now multiply that by five. Now add in the fact that I have to sunscreen myself. Now you understand why I hate the summer. “We’re going to the beach next week? Well, I’d better start putting sunscreen on them now.” True, we are Catholic, but I sometimes feel that it’s the sunscreen industry that is more pleased that Jeannie and I have so many children. We must be dramatically increasing overall sales.