Mandatory heart-rending parenting post...

So you may have noticed that I haven't exactly been keeping up the usual breakneck pace of posting lately. It's partially because I'm somewhat blocked, not sure what's up with that. But a lot of it has to do with the fact that I'm working a little bit, for the Census Bureau. It's bullshit work, 15 hours a week for at-least-it's-better-than-Starbucks-pay. I sit in someone else's place of business for 3-hour stretches waiting for nobody to come in to ask for help in filling out their census form. Part of the reason nobody comes in is poor advertising, and part of it is because it's a FUCKING 10 QUESTION CENSUS FORM. If you haven't seen it, if you know what your name is, and the names, genders and races of the people who you live with are, then you really don't need me. And even if you don't know those things, you can fake it if you're semi-literate. But it's work...technically.

Because of said work (I'd get cute and go all ironic quotation marks around "work," but I'm not in the mood), I will, for the first time in the 5 years I've been a parent, miss something. It's a YMCA league basketball game, his first of the "season." So far, I've made it to every swimming lesson, every tee-ball game, and every soccer/basketball game. So obviously, when I figured out that the basketball game conflicted with my 9-12 shift of doing nothing for money, I was bummed. I was pissed that I'd have to miss the game, and questioning what it meant to my whole "family > career" dynamic. But then two things happened.

Yesterday, he lost his first tooth. Details are sketchy as to how it happened, but it was a lower front, the kind that will forever allow us to mark pictures from the next however long, because there's no doubt when his mouth is open (which is always). That meant a visit from the tooth fairy, who, after studying the market, soliciting feedback from the other parents on Facebook, and checking his and the wife's coat pockets, decided that a five-spot was the way to go, along with a Hot Wheel from the secret stash of emergency toy presents. The operation went smoothly, taking the little plastic treasure chest the school nurse gave him out, removing the tooth (its second extraction of the day), and replacing the treasure chest with the money and the car. He rolled over and sighed while I was in there, but I made it out undetected.

Fast forward to 6:50, or 10 minutes before wake-up time. "Daddy, can I get up?" came the call. Usually, it's met with a simple "no...10 more minutes," more begging than ordering. But I was awake already, so what the hell. I went in, having mostly forgotten about my visit from the night before. But he hadn't. "Daddy...daddy...the...the...tooth fairy left me a race car and...(looking) FIVEDOLLARS...FIVEDOLLARS Daddy!" I smiled and sat down on the bed behind him. He leaned back onto me and ripped open the package, pulling out the randomly selected Hot Wheel and running it over the bed, making a the requisite quiet "vroom" noise (quiet because Mommy was still asleep). One of the cats joined us, and he started petting her with one hand and running the car over her tail with the other. This proved to be confusing but acceptable to her. He was wide awake, but still a little groggy, so he slumped back against me, leaving the car on the bed, speculating as to why the maid service we still indulge ourselves in using would put his new Star Wars sheets on upside down the way they did. He posited that it was so he could see the characters facing up to him the right way as he lay between the sheets, their lightsabres forever pointing up at him. Sound theory, even if I knew it was more likely that it was a coin flip as to which way the sheets would go on. No more than three minutes went by this whole time, then it was time to get up and start the day, which I signified with a kiss on the head and a "let's go, buddy." The smile on his face, still aglow from the revelation of the tooth fairy's bounty, was indescribable. "Can we put my fivedollars" (lack of spacing intentional, by the way, thank you large sandwich chain for indelibly imprinting 'fivedollarfootlong' on his brain, as though it were one word) "with my Wii money?" See, we're trying to teach him a few basics about money, i.e. its lack of a tendency to grow on trees and such, so he's saving up the occasional dollars he earns for doing odd jobs toward a yet-unspecified game for the Wii. The dentatorially (I don't care) mandated Abe Lincoln brings him to about 12 bucks, so he's more than halfway there, unless he's looking for Madden 10 or something. "Of course you can, here, I'll do it now" I said, setting it up on his dresser with the rest. With that, the spell was broken, and he ran downstairs, ready to start the day.

That led to the second thing, a revelation of sorts (ok, I'm overselling it. More of a slow-developing thought that marinated over the next few hours). Fuck the basketball game. That's what I'm in this for, that last few minutes. Could've been me, could've been Mommy, doesn't matter. Tomorrow, at the game, barring something unusual, nothing will happen. He'll pratice for 1/2 hour and play a game for 1/2 hour. In practice, he'll try to dribble between his legs and fail (my fault. I'm useless as a legit basketball player, so I go all Globetrotter anytime I've got the rock...I can't make 6 out of 10 layups, but I've got trace amounts of handle). During the game, he'll make a shot or he won't. Whatever. Because the moment upstairs, before the obligations of the day took over, marveling at the handiwork of the Tooth Fairy and speculating on the sheet-orientation habits of a Dial-A-Maid employee, was the real moment. That may sound obvious, but that realization led to a bigger realization (you might even say, a Larger Point).

I'm not the only one who has to work tomorrow (meaning a Saturday, btw). I have to work not because "Mr. Dithers needs me to work on the Penske file," but because I have a schedule, and that schedule says "Sat. 9-12." The whole "I must be there for every soccer practice, school play, recital and game" notion really is a silly product of the Upper East Side (Upper West Side? I don't know which is which, and frankly I don't care, because fuck New York, too) "Mommy Wars" mentality, in which interactions with your child have meaning only if they occur a) in public and b) in the context of structured activity. I have to be there for the game because to not be there is to Not Be There. Working is a choice for those assholes, and the Noble Stand they take to leave the office early to be horrifying stage parents is, among other things, a Giant Fucking Luxury that they usually don't appreciate in the slightest. The funny part? Of everyone in this situation, the one that understands the most is the boy. You can't be there because you have to work? Oh, ok. Can I have a piece of candy now? (subtext: I'm over it, truly). Kindergartners, more so than most adults, understand the concept of "have to," because it's their entire life. Get out of bed, eat your cereal, get dressed, go to school, line up, sit down, line up, go to gym, line up, sit down, line up go to lunch, eat your lunch, put your coat on, line up, go outside, line up, go back inside, sit down, line up, go get on the bus, go to the Y, line up, time for art class, line up, back to your room, get your coat, get in the car, eat your dinner, put your toys away, get in the bathtub, go to sleep. There's very little leeway in that routine for them, so the fact that I have to go sit in someone else's office while he's playing one of his 25 basketball games this calendar year is really not much of a revelation to him. Someday, someone may try to tell him that tomorrow was a bad thing. And hopefully, what he'll think, is (in all it's time-shifted glory) "fuck tomorrow. We had this morning."