|
There are
few, if any, positive experiences as disruptive as having a
child. It’s chaotic, turbulent, maddening and beautiful all at
the same time. Everyone knows that it’s about nine months from
conception to birth, but the reality is that new parents only
have about six months to prepare. That’s because the first month
is filled with not even being aware of the pregnancy. The second
is filled with not believing the pregnancy is real - longer for
fathers. The third is taken up by trying to determine what
supplies will be provided by compassionate relatives who know
what is about to happen to your nice, quiet lives. It’s around
the fourth month that it really hits you and you make the trip
to the baby supply store. The baby supply store is great. They
have everything you’ll need for your child right up until he or
she is eligible for Social Security. They sell everything
except babies, and, take my word for it, the store employees
have heard that joke before and don’t find it even slightly
amusing.
The first
person you encounter upon entering the baby store, which I will
call the “BS” from now on, is the person who wants you to sign
up for the BS registry. It works just like a wedding registry in
that future parents go through the store with a little scanning
machine or a catalog and make up a list of items that they want
to have, but are so overpriced that they would never buy for
themselves. They also throw in a few cheap items they don’t
really want so they don’t seem greedy. This list is supposed to
used by friends and relatives who will be attending the baby
shower (which, ironically, can also be shortened to BS), so that
they can put as little thought and creativity into their gift
purchase as possible. You can enter any BS right now and see
couples going through this procedure. The mother-to-be will be looking
at every item in the store. The father-to-be will be holding the
little scanning machine. The scanning machine is technology, and
this is how they get the fathers to participate. Someday, some
brilliant person will combine the BS with an electronics store
and a sporting goods store and that day the tide will turn.
Until then, the scanning machine, much like the TV remote, is
all we’ve got.
My wife and I
did the whole BS registry thing for our first child
together. Most people don’t do it for the children after that,
since by then they can’t fit any more junk in the house anyway.
I was a little concerned about even walking into a store with
the word “Baby” in its name, but I’m truly glad I did. They have
cool stuff in there. You heard me right. Cool stuff. OK, they
do have diapers and little tiny shoes that only fit babies too
small to stand and all the toys that you will eventually find
embedded in the bottom of your bare foot at 2:00 AM, but they
have cool stuff too. Baby tech. If you look next to the baby
monitors, which use technology from the 1970’s and work like a
static riddled, one way cordless phone with a volume switch,
you’ll find the baby surveillance systems. Oh yes, surveillance
systems! These things have miniature color cameras with
microphones and VCR controls. Some can be controlled by a
computer. I think I saw one with Dolby Digital sound. They zoom,
they pan. Hook it up to your big screen TV and invite the
neighbors over to watch the baby sleep! Hook it up to a DVD
burner and make DVDs of the baby sleeping! Use the
picture-in-picture function on the TV to keep one eye on the
sleeping baby and one eye on the game. Yes, the BS store has
come through for us in the field of baby monitoring.
Now, you need
a safe place for your baby to sleep, and that’s where the crib
comes in. Those of you who have never had a baby in your house
need to be aware that the word cribs actually stands for Caged
Ridiculous Individual who’s Barely Sleeping. Once you have your
child asleep inside the crib, you must maintain complete silence
in and around the crib location. This is CRUCIAL. Some parents
have been known to attempt to quiet their entire neighborhood at
naptime. So how can you check on your baby, who’s barely
sleeping inside a cage on wheels? You need a baby monitoring
system. See how it all fits together?
You need to
make your home safe for a baby also, because eventually they do
begin to get around. The BS has you covered. You could buy
cabinet locks that are really large size zip ties that go around
the cabinet handles so kids can’t open them, or you could do
what I did. I bought magnetized, hidden locks for each cabinet
and drawer in our kitchen. They’re great. No one even knows the
cabinets are locked until they try to open one. I just sit back
and laugh to myself while people furiously pull on the doors
thinking they’re stuck or broken. Ha ha. Then I just walk up to
the cabinet with the little magnet “key” in my hand and
magically open it right up and give them that “Aren’t you a
completely helpless human being” look. Well, that’s how it
worked in my mind while I was throwing handfuls of these locks
from hell into the BS shopping cart. The lock part goes on the
inside of the door so no one can see it. The problem is, that
also means no one (including me) knows exactly where it is. You
are supposed to place the magnet key on the outside of the door
directly opposite the lock part and it opens right up. The
reality is, you squat in front of the cabinet with your ear to
the door like a safecracker, moving the key all over the surface
of the door hoping desperately to hear the little click that
means it’s unlocked. What really happens is that as soon as I
hear that little click, I move to get out of the way of the door
so I can open it, slide the key two microns off the sweet spot
and hear another little click that tells me it’s locked again.
Sometimes I go through this for hours. I installed these locks.
I will not be beaten.
“click”
Try to open
“click”
You
miserable, rotten ….
“click”
Slowly move,
reach the handle, pull …
“click”
Aarrrgggg!
At that
point, I throw the magnet key across the room and, using both
hands, grab the handle and violently shake the door until it
flies open. Then I look in the cabinet and fail to find what I
was looking for, close the door and hope the kids didn’t learn
how to open it by watching me.
The BS also
sells a dizzying array of gates that you are supposed to use to
protect the children from gaining access to dangerous rooms and
stairs. Children quickly learn how to climb over or under these
“restraints” or, failing that, just bulldoze them out of their
way. Adults will find these tiny gates completely
incapacitating. There will be injuries. One of the most inhumane
things you can do to a law abiding and currently sane adult is
to put gates and locks all over the house. This is why parents
look the way they do.
Safety is not
just for the home, though, and you can also find hundreds and
hundreds of car seats at the BS. They all do one thing well,
which is to prevent you from going anywhere quickly. The other
thing most of them do well is catch baby spit up, thereby saving
your precious upholstery. You can spend many hundreds of dollars
on a baby car seat depending on which model you choose. There
are big ones, small ones, ones that use the car’s seat belt,
ones that use a locking system so convoluted that only the baby
can work it, pretty ones, ugly ones and at least one that will
look like you stole it from an unlocked Space Shuttle. These are
a necessity, though; so whichever one you choose, install it
right and use it.
Now, whenever
you get to wherever you were going, you’ll need additional baby
storage and transportation products. You need a stroller. Yes,
you do. Babies are cute and everyone wants to hold them, but
only for 1.47 minutes at a time (on average). When not being
held, the baby can be strapped securely into a stroller with
lots of storage space and at least 4 wheels, more if you can
afford it, less if you want to look goofy. The truth is, you’ll
probably end up looking goofy at least once every time you use
the stroller no matter which kind you choose. Strollers fold up,
usually before you’re ready. If your model has wheels that
swivel, they will lock up when you are running full speed in the
rain through the parking lot looking for your car, and your
inertia will send you tumbling into a Range Rover, setting off
an insanely loud car alarm and annoying the huge dog inside the
vehicle.
But enough
about me.
The chances
are good that if you enter a store with it, you will get the
stroller stuck in between two racks of clothes because you
figure that the people who set up these stores take average
stroller width into account, but they don’t. In my experience,
any time the baby in the stroller can reach anything in the
store, that item will be expensive and fragile, or the baby will
have sticky/messy hands. It doesn’t even matter how clean you
think the baby should be. You could take a child straight out of
a bathtub and into a Sears store and the child would leave a
trail of sticky hand marks on lots of tools, clothing and
sporting goods you have no intention of buying. I’m pretty sure
babies ooze sticky stuff out of their little pores.
The other
thing you’ll need is some sort of baby supply storage. You can
choose anything from a tiny little bag to a backpack to a
suitcase sized portable supply cabinet with a built-in changing
table. I like the backpack type because it looks like a backpack
and not a bag full of diapers, wipes and 4 complete changes of
clothes even though that’s what it contains. The downside of
this is that since it looks like a backpack, some knucklehead
may want to swipe it. I leave mine out in the open hoping
someone will steal it, thinking it holds a laptop computer or
bundles of cash. I picture the dummy gathering all his thief
friends together in their hideout to split the booty and getting
laughed out of the gang for stealing a diaper bag.
I suppose I
need a hobby.
One of the
most amazing things about getting ready for your first baby is
that it is entirely possible to spend more money on supplies and
gadgets and equipment for the baby than you paid for the house
you’ll keep them in. It’s fun, though. It’s exciting to
anticipate parenthood. It gives you something to do for four or
five months. The fine associates at the BS know this and revel
in it. They know that people enjoy buying stuff for a couple
starting a family. That’s why the BS registry is so great. Plus,
you get to use the scanner.
|
