THE SQUID WEEKLY
ISSUE 54
<<<
PREVIOUS
NEXT >>>
Good morning. I’m a delinquent parent. You may notice my children—Jake and the other little shit—are stomping on the petunias in your garden. This is less because I’m busy, and more for the fact that I didn’t want kids in the first place, and I’m hoping someone will take them while I’m checking Facebook. Yes, it’s terrible. No, I don’t care what you think.
How did I get myself in this situation? Well, let’s just say I enjoy the idea of children more than the reality—and yet still had five. Yep, one kid pushed my capabilities as a parent. People started questioning at two and severely doubting at three. When the fourth child dropped, most of the neighbors left. And at the fifth, the government sent a letter that said in so many words, “We don’t want to go all China on you but stop. Now.”
Children can be fun-loving gifts of nature who bring joy and delight to the world around them—staring in awe at a butterfly, stomping in rain puddles, saying cute nonsense. But somewhere along the way God forgot about my brood. It’s partly my fault, partly because these children tend to evil.
Whereas some children sit quietly reading books and graciously thank their elders, other demon-ridden spawn ram their trucks into people’s legs at the dentist’s office, pee in the saltwater aquarium, and enjoy sinking their teeth into flesh, which is either a phase or a sign of serious psychiatric problems.
Most children will break down at some point, and parents can do nothing to stop it. My children, however, scream longer and louder than any other creature in existence, piercing wails that would rip the eardrums out of a woodpecker. Some have compared it to the sound someone makes when he or she is dropped into a cauldron of acid or is cutting off a finger with a dull knife.
In the spare moments they aren’t screaming, the children lash out when their Goldfish cracker supply is threatened or the TV is changed to something other than colorful, androgynous… things who sing about spending time with family and sharing.
But as a parent, I’m protected. Even if my child has a knife to your throat and is demanding your social security number, credit cards, and any spare Thomas the Train engines you have, you can’t do anything. It doesn’t matter if I’m misusing my privileges or making a bad name for parents who actually try. It doesn’t matter that one of my kids is blindly shoving a screwdriver into an electrical socket or assaulting their sibling with a stapler.
What does matter is you will be punished for daring to think this day will be different, that this day a negligent parent will corral their spawn instead loosing them like a hoard of ravaging locusts to feed upon the tenuous goodwill of the masses who only beg to get through this day without being molested by a seven-year-old with an iPhone.
You’re trapped. You can’t mention the blind wrath of God that will rain down upon these children should they touch any of your personal belongings. You can’t allude to the fact that one day their parents and friends will all die. And you sure can’t tell them that in the Aztec’s society, children just like them had their hearts cut out to make sure it rained. Even though they did.
Instead, you must wait for me to step in. Unfortunately for you, usually the only time I take any parental responsibility is when child protective services knocks on the door or my children fry their nervous system so much they can’t say their name. At this point, my strategy is to blame other people for my problems, which makes me feel justified and gives me an excuse to shove more of my vitriolic blather on the Internet.
The spare times I am paying attention, my main role is to yell and mistake my children’s issues for deep-rooted problems of my own. I like enforcing standards and then undermining them so often the kid doesn’t know if she pees standing up or sitting down. If you’re wondering how I get through life, it’s a mixture of closing my eyes and wine.
The only solace you may take from my situation is that you have a ticket out of hell, whereas I am stuck here. You should be glad. You don’t have to take your meals in ten second bursts or threaten small humans with violence. You get to go back to reality—though it will be a reality in which most of your petunias are dead.
NEW ISSUES EVERY FRIDAY
Don't forget.
ALSO, SHARE THIS WITH PEOPLE. DESTROY THEIR BRAIN IN A GOOD WAY.
Shove it into their hands and shout, “I LOVE YOU."
Cram it into their Facebook feed.
They need this.