Toddler Tales: An Older Dad Survives the Raising of Young Children in Modern America Read online

Toddler Tales

  An Older Dad Survives Raising Young Children in Modern America

  Lee B. Mulder

  Toddler Tales

  Mulder, Lee B.

  Copyright © 2007-2014 Lee B. Mulder

  OSC Publishers, Inc.

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author / publisher.

  Toddler Tales

  An Older Dad Survives Raising Young Children in Modern America

  Lee B. Mulder

  Table of Contents

  Introduction

  A Lesson in Economics

  A Night on the Town

  The Stain Maven

  Working at Home

  Potty Training

  Oh, To Find A Babysitter

  One Way to Cope

  The Little Sponge Brains

  Children CAN Be Useful

  The Perfect Negotiator

  Obedience Training Your Child

  The Drum

  Two Hours of Bonding

  The Candy Days

  Babyproof

  Diversionary Tactics at Work

  Did I Hear That Right?

  Once I Was An Adult

  Mein Dipe

  No Diet Works like the BRAT Diet

  Charming, Just Charming

  About Chewing Gum

  Beyond the Why Game

  Gimme That Educational Toy

  Breaking Away

  All We Are Saying is Give Peas a Chance

  The Great Juice Dilemma

  The Day the Fish Died

  A Kitchen for Christmas

  The Tooth Fairy

  In the Night

  About the Author

  Introduction

  Raising children may be the most important task we have as human beings. But none of us is adequately prepared for the task. Kids don’t come with manuals. Our own experience is incomplete. Grandma and grandpa probably don’t live nearby enough to assist. And times have changed, with forces of influence working on young children today that didn’t exist in our parents’ time. This truth applies to all modern parents, but when people are in their forties and fifties raising kids under three years old, the scenario becomes more complicated.

  I know.

  I lived it.

  In the wide repertoire of tests for a marriage, somewhere between wallpapering the bathroom and blatant infidelity, sits surviving a two year old. For older moms and dads, the test takes on the aura of a final exam where the entire rest of your life is at stake. I've thought about this quite a bit... why is it harder for older couples than younger couples? Probably because we've gotten into comfortable routines at home and at work and confident roles as life partners. Some people call it a rut and it drives them nuts and that's why they have children...

  to add a little spice to the routine. For others, having children late is the “it’s now or never” fulfillment of human responsibility.

  Whatever the reason, life with small children is different for people in their forties and fifties than it is for people in their twenties, simply because the former have experienced far more life than the latter. For some of us, especially dual-career couples, this means we have more money to spend on our kids than we would have had as a young couple. Through living more life, we have many more goals and expectations that we project onto our children. We’ve had a chance to fail and want to protect our kids from re-making our mistakes. We've seen a great many things in our lives, people we like and don't like, behavior we like and don't like, places we like and don't like, and we believe we can choose the best of the best in order to mold our children accordingly.

  Of course, this is folly.

  Contrast this notion with young parents who have no such perspective or bankroll and simply let the child develop into his or her own self with mom and dad doing the best they can. Either way, the child ends up an independent adult. It's just that we more mature parents think we have more control than we actually do.

  For most of us, children represent a seriously altered lifestyle. Before children, we've had success at work, nice vacations and indulgent hobbies. We've learned to operate in an adult world. We have acquired breakable things, furniture we like, cars without Cheerios and clothes that permanently stain with spit -up baby formula. Many an older mom faces a tough choice – continue working or stay home to raise the kids. Does she turn the kids over to others... nannies or martyrs running day care centers or does she put away the panty hose in favor of sweat clothes?

  I know the hard choices. I lived them.

  To cope, I turned to humor. When my son was two years old, I began writing columns about my child rearing experiences for the local newspaper. This was no advice column, as I was perhaps the least authoritative resource on the subject in town. It was, instead, a series of glimpses of what life is like for an older dad in the new age of child -rearing in suburban America. This book is a collection of those columns.

  My hope is, if you are or were an older parent, you will see yourself somewhere in these pages and realize you are not alone.

  Lee B. Mulder

  Chicago, IL

  A Lesson in Economics

  Yesterday, my son wanted a Lifesaver. I heard the jingling in his jeans and thought it would be a good time to start teaching him the value of money. "You may have a Lifesaver," I said, "but it will cost you a penny."

  He smiled at the thought of the game and dug his hand deep into the pocket. He gave me the penny and got the Lifesaver. Transaction complete. Lesson learned. Good job, dad. Smart dad. Wise, guiding, good-example dad.

  After a few moments, well after the candy had been chewed to bits, William tugged on my sleeve. "Daddy, I want my penny." Now the real lesson begins, I thought. I said okay, but only if he gave me the Lifesaver back in its original condition.

  His face grew thoughtful as he realized he could not do that, so he initiated Plan B and began to yell for the penny. I became steadfast. "No, son. A lesson is a lesson." Pretty soon, the scream turned into a whiny yowl, a sound guaranteed to attract mom.

  "What's going on?" she asked.

  "Daddy won't give me my penny," the victim cried.

  "It's a lesson in economics," I said. "The hard truth about paying for your pleasures and learning the meaning of money, the value of a dollar, the reality of life, the..."

  She gave me that "oh, brother, he's only three, isn't this pushing the adult world on him a little early" look.

  About that time, my neighbor Bob came in the back door. "Anybody home?" he said in his unflaggingly cheerful style.

  "Mister Haskins, Mister Haskins," my son cried, running up to him. "My daddy won't give me back my penny."

  Bob, the attorney, never one to pass an opportunity to build his clientele, bent down to hear the complainant out. "Did you give him the penny?" he asked.

  "Yes."

  "And what did you get in return?"

  "A Lifesaver," my son said, showing the evidence stuck in his teeth.

  "Sounds like a fair trade. So what's the problem?”

  “I want my penny."

  "And dad won't give it back?”

  “Yeeaaaahhheaaahhahahah," he said launching into the loud wail.
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br />   "Well, let's sue him."

  William quieted, listened, sniffled once. "What's stew?”

  “That's where we take him to court to get the penny back." William listened intently with his little sponge brain. "We really don't have a very good case. After all, you did eat the Lifesaver, but we can sue anyway." I started to protest, but my son's counsel continued boldly forward with his advice. "We probably won't go to court because it'll cost your dad a lot more than a penny to go there and get the judge to tell him he can keep his penny, so he'll probably settle out of court.”

  “Can I have my penny?"

  "Probably, if we do this right," the attorney whispered conspiratorially.

  "Now wait just a minute," I said, "this is getting out of hand. It was just a lesson in economics."

  "I want my penny NOW!!" said the plaintiff.

  "I coulda made it REAL LIFE," I said, beginning to heat up, "Like ... take the kid's penny, give him the Lifesaver and then mug him for it. Or, how about this... once he agrees to the deal and I know he's a live buyer for one penny, I jack up the price for cost overruns and squeeze him for all the money he has in his pocket ... and I then give him half the Lifesaver. Or I coulda done the deal but bit off a piece of the Lifesaver for taxes. Now THERE's a lesson in economics." I found myself walking around the room in circles flailing my arms. "And if he gripes about getting shortchanged, I coulda thrown him out of the house for not paying back taxes and then he'd be homeless and on the dole." I was running out of scenarios.

  "Or you could settle out of court," my neighbor said calmly.

  I looked into my son's hopeful little face, seeing myself in some sort of a time warp mirror, and caved in. "Okay, okay, here's your penny."

  But just as my son reached up to claim his property, a hand shot out and grabbed the coin. It was Bob. "Sorry. Legal fees." He