19 April 2008

Things I miss from before I was a parent

Here are just 10 of the things I miss from the days before I became a parent (avoiding the easy cliches of "sleep" and "free time"):

1. Unmolested rolls of toilet paper. Rolling toilet paper back onto the roll is like putting toothpaste back into the tube, which I've also done. That brings me to #2. (Doesn't everything these days?)

2. Unmolested tubes of toothpaste.

3. Not having to patrol the house like a prison guard whenever certain cranky someones decide to wake up too early, in defiance of their incredibly precious freedom to sleep as long as they want, wherever they want, whenever they want.

4. Toy-free paths between any two points of interest in my house.

5. The ability to procrastinate in peace.

6. Not having to constantly check if other people are still wearing both of their shoes.

7. A vomit-free couch.

8. Sitting around watching movies and playing board games with J-; not having to make sure everything we did was model behavior; and being able to make last-second plans and just jump in the car and go somewhere. See #9.

9. Not having to spend half an hour before leaving the house thinking of all the things I might be forgetting, gathering supplies for a possible (and likely) day-long siege, and corralling, outfitting, and corralling (again) two kids hyperactive at the thought of leaving the house.

10. Having much less stuff laying around needing to be straightened up. I have no delusions of former neatness-- organizing large amounts of things all at once has always been hard for me (such as when moving, which we've done three times now), because of the too-fine focus of my OCD. I've always been best at maintaining an already-clean space, while J-'s the big-cleanup-all-at-once (but not often) type, so between the two of us, very little gets cleaned-- the sheer volume of Things now is just overwhelming.

Bonus! 11. Not having to spend a surprising amount of my day coming up with answers to rapid-fire questions like, "Where are the pirates in this land? [America]" and "Why aren't there any pirates anymore?"

Things I would miss from being a parent

1. My kids and their endearing antics, too numerous to list. Damn those cute buggers.

7 comments:

Crafty Lady said...

i love this post so much!

Mama Dawg said...

Mine was going to movies in the theatre.

Emily
http://www.twodogsrunningsouth.blogspot.com/

LiteralDan said...

Glad you liked it, katie!

mama dawg: I definitely miss movies in the theater, but I skipped that one since I figure technically we could find a babysitter and still do that. (But who can afford to do that all the time? Not us!)

Since we used to work in a movie theater we got really spoiled in that respect, and just talking about it now makes me really wanna go see a movie.

You available for babysitting, by any chance? :-)

Amy@UWM said...

Great post. So with you on #11. I'm particularly enjoying the "What if" series that I'm getting lately from my 5 year old ("What if our house had wings and it was an airplane and it could fly?" or "What if you were my daughter and Dad was my brother?")

LiteralDan said...

Oh we've only just dipped our toes into that lake of fun. I should probably get prepared with some ammo to launch back.

"What if you guys took your night's sleep and naps all at once and let Daddy sleep in a little bit, so then he had more energy to spend at the park with you and thought of lots more fun games to play and we ate candy and ice cream all day long because of it??"

I wonder if that subtle hint would work? Hmmm...

Mama Dawg said...

Heck to the no on babysitting! LOL!

I just miss the freedom to go to the movies on a whim. Now it has to be scheduled or I have to see something incredibly insipid like "College Road Trip" or some such crap. Nothing that I really want to see. I have to wait til the DVD comes out!

LiteralDan said...

Yeah the spontaneity is definitely nice. And man, I feel for you on watching stuff like "College Road Trip"-- good luck getting your two hours back!

J- and I have a very narrow window in which we can even watch DVDs, since she has to get up so early for work. Hopefully it will be better next school year, if she can work somewhere closer.

Well now I just feel bad for myself... lol