This is an excerpt from my book, From Zero to Four Kids in Thirty Seconds. This excerpt is from Chapter 4, Adored and Ignored, and the scene occurs right after Mark and I purchased our first futon together.
Tip # 24: If you get as much respect as Rodney Dangerfield, you’ll have to teach the children respect.
Mark was master of his futon for about eight days, upon which time the four kids came to visit again. Come movie time on Friday night, Simone and Samantha beat us to the futon.
“That’s not right,” I whispered.
“What are you going to do about it?” Mark whispered back.
“Set things right. Teach them a little respect.”
“Good luck.”
Of course, it takes time to teach children respect and it isn’t anything to rush into. So, that evening passed and the next morning, and as I forced myself to do some of those mundane things I hadn’t done in a while — like laundry, balancing my check book and removing the spider webs dangling from the corners of my living room — I contemplated how to go about teaching the kids respect.
I was about to vacuum when luckily, the phone rang.
“When are you coming over?”
I sighed, suddenly thinking that it’d be nice to have time to finish my housework. You know, come home to a clean apartment just once. Take my cans, bottles and newspapers to the recycling center. Maybe even write a letter or two.
“I’ve got to eat something, you know, and stop at the grocery store to pick up some snacks and stuff. Probably be there in thirty minutes?”
“Okay,” Mark sighed. “You know, I can’t even get down the driveway anymore before Conrad asks if we’re going to see you. He asked about you again this morning.”
Suddenly, I forgot about the checkbook and recycling stuff and the fact that my coffee table was very, very dusty and that the orange, vinyl sink in my bathroom needed cleaning. It would wait until later, I reasoned, like after work some night when the kids weren’t around.
“Want to come for dinner?” Mark asked.
“I’ll bring something.”
It was an impulsive answer, and at the grocery store a few minutes later, I realized I hadn’t gone grocery shopping and cooked for four kids before. I found myself wandering around the store mumbling, How much do four kids and two adults eat? What do kids like to eat? How much effort do I put into making sure they eat right? What if they don’t like what I make?
Not knowing the answer to any of these questions, I loaded my cart full of snacks and enough dinner makings for a small army.
I greeted Mark by handing him one of the four bags of groceries with, “I didn’t know what the kids liked.”
“Well, chances are good they’ll like something in all of this.”
As soon as I closed the door behind me, Conrad wrapped his arms and legs around my right leg and sat cross-legged on the floor looking up at me. I looked down and shook my head.
“You know,” I said as I took off my coat. “If you were on the kitchen floor where it’s slippery, I’d make a mop out of your butt. But as it is, I’ll have to give your butt a rug burn by dragging you across the carpet.”
“No!” he screamed. I bent down and tickled him and he ran out of the room.
“Weird children,” I said to Mark.
“That was my ex-wife’s genes at work,” he explained.
“Well, after we put this food away, let’s see if your genes can climb trees.”
We took the kids to a park in a suburb of Lansing that has one of those huge wooden complexes where kids either run around like the Tasmanian Devil, or work their way cautiously around the complex, stopping now and again and yelling, “Mom, Dad, look at me!”
Mark’s kids being the Tasmanian devil types, I found myself playing “Chase me!” with Elizabeth, climbing trees with Conrad, and playing “King of the Mountain” on a pile of bark chips with the big kids and Mark. Between activities, I watched other mothers to see if I was doing a good job pretending to be one of them. I noticed I wasn’t. None of them climbed trees or played “King of the Mountain.”
Back at Mark’s apartment, I was feeling good about myself for no sound reason as I merrily made a batch of rigatoni. Along with a salad and some French bread, I thought I’d put together an okay dinner.
Until we had sat down at the table and Simone poked the rigatoni.
“Are these noodles supposed to be rubbery like this?”
I poked the noodles and smiled a crooked smile, “Of course.”
“What did you forget to do?” Mark asked.
“Cook the noodles before I baked them.”
“I see.”
“It still tastes good,” Samantha offered.
“Thank you.” I cleared my throat, looked at Mark, and, using my deep, command voice said, “Yeah, it still tastes good. Now eat it. And don’t say another word about it.”
To take everyone’s thoughts away from the rigid rigatoni, I grabbed the French bread and began wrestling with it, pretending it was a force to be reckoned with as I tried to rip off a chunk. I pulled it up to my neck as if it was getting the best of me, wrested it to my waist, yanked off a piece and held it up in victory.
“That was lovely, dear,” Mark said. “Can we have some?”
As each child took turns taking on the mad French bread, the others unconsciously stuffed rigatoni in their faces. When Mark got the bread he looked at me with furrowed eyebrows and said, “Watch this.” We all watched as he masterfully ripped off a wad of bread and placed the bread calmly on the table. “Now, you try.” This time, the mad French bread took me right off my chair and onto the floor, where I finally pinned it down. The children all laughed. Mark told them not to encourage me.
The bread and tough rigatoni disappeared and as we cleaned up from dinner, I asked whether we would be seeing a movie.
“But of course,” Mark said. “Will you be staying?”
“Yes,” I said quickly. “And I’m calling first dibs on the futon.”
“I have second dibs,” Mark said.
That’s how we got a seat on the futon. And taught the kids respect.