Author: Rebecca Cuneo Keenan

DAILY SNACK

There was a little graduation ceremony,
Replete with a three-song performance,
For Colum’s two-week-long kindergarten readiness program.
He’d been practicing these call-back songs for days.
In the car he started to sing them again.
But this time he got Irene to echo every line.
“With their hands in their pockets,”
“Anns in pockis”
“And their pockets in their pants,”
“And pockis in panz,”
“All the little fishies doing the hootchie kootchie dance.”
“Fissies do kootzy kootzy dense.”
It was pretty much the cutest thing I’ve ever heard.

DAILY SNACK

Emma Waverman told me not to take the kids shopping.

***

I needed a new pair of jeans,
And there was simply no way I could maneuver the stroller
Down the narrow aisle where the middling sizes were hanging.
So I parked the stroller near the end of the rack,
And told Colum to look in the mirror and make funny faces with his sister.
I edged my way to the middle of the row of pants,
And looked up to see my kids.
Okay.
One pair of dark wash jeans and another one size up to try on.
Got ’em.
I look up and … no kids.
Okay, stay calm.
Colum probably just pushed the stroller around the corner.
“Colum. Colum. COLUM. COLLLLLUUUUUMMM!!!!”
As far as the eye can see,
Row upon row of racks of clothes.
They could be anywhere.
An employee tells me she saw them in the toy section.
I look around.
Where the hell is the toy section?
I am in the middle of the store and the toys are in the far corner.
How could they have gotten all the way over there?
I run over anyway and see other kids — not mine.
Now they could be anywhere.
I rush back to the middle of the store and now we’re playing by my rules.
“COLUM! COLUM!”
“I’M MISSING A FOUR YEAR OLD AND A ONE YEAR OLD IN A STROLLER!”
“HAS ANYONE SEEN MY KIDS?!”
The sales lady tells me to stay calm, we’ll find them.
Fuck you, I think, and push past her.
It’s not even that I’m panicking exactly.
Not yet, anyway.
It has still been under five minutes that they’ve been missing.
These are precautionary measures.
Because I dare you to make off with my kids while I’m yelling bloody murder in the middle of the store.
I dare you to walk out with a four year old and a one year old in a stroller when every other person knows they’re mine.
Immediately, another shopper calls out that they are in the toy section after all.
“I told you they were there,” chides the sales lady. “There was no need to panic.”
Oh, I’m sorry. Did I upset your customers with my MISSING CHILDREN?
But I say nothing.

***

The good news is that I didn’t leave with anything I hated after all.

DAILY SNACK

I am so sick of the life as a journey metaphor.
Aren’t you?
Every blog you read, every freaking reality show,
Promises to take you along on someone else’s journey.
Really? To where?
Oh, I see …
What they really mean is,
Indulge me while I vomit up all my emotions and insecurities,
And otherwise over share the minutiae of my daily life.
You know,
Like I sometimes do here despite myself.
But at least I won’t call it a journey.

DAILY SNACK

“Don’t run, Becky. Don’t run.”
I would try not to, I really would.
But then there was my very own Daddy waiting to take me home,
And I could see him standing there,
Arms outstretched.
Those arms were the safest and most secure place in the entire world.
So I ran despite myself.

***

“Now don’t run, Colum,” chides Glenda.
And I watch him carefully step one foot in front of the other,
Until he gets about half-way down the corridor.
“Mommy! Mommy!”
And he’s off running,
Right into my arms.
The way it was meant to be.

DAILY SNACK

My husband has a full-time job,
And he also picks up freelance work on the side.
I have a part-time job, a blog, and aspire to find the time to pitch freelance work on the side.
We recently moved into a house that needs a lot of work.
We have two children under five,
And NO child care.

Then there’s life.
There’s visiting family and friends,
And maybe even doing something ourselves as a  family every once in a while.
The weekends become exalted oases of free time.
Forget free time — time to catch up on work that I care about,
Work that will never otherwise get done because it’s not screaming,
“Feed me now!”

So I do know that it’s unreasonable,
But when my work gets bumped,
Again,
In favour of my husband’s more pressing, higher paying,
Admittedly more important work,
And I’m left taking care of the kids and the housework for the sixth or seventh day that week,
It’s hard not to feel resentful.
A little bit.

DAILY SNACK

I once read something about women —  mothers — undermining their identities by using images of their kids as their Facebook profile pictures.
There was a shred of truth to that, it seemed.
Where there once was the image of a young woman,
There is now a drooling baby, grinning toddler, or worse,
A pet.
I would like to defend, however, pictures of mothers with their children.
They could be saying that this is me now as a nurturing caregiver,
This is a representative shot from my daily life.
I suppose.
Or it could simply be the sad truth,
That very rarely does anybody take a picture of the mom.
They take pictures of the kids and sometimes,
Every once in a while,
The mom happens to be in the shot.
So when it comes to switching up your profile pic, it could simply be,
That those are the shots you have to work with.

DAILY SNACK

We don’t have air conditioning.
We don’t have air conditioning and I have been reduced to that sticky spot on the kitchen floor.
Well, maybe not quite yet,
But I have taken to finally falling asleep under the ceiling fan in the living room around 3am,
(The kids have a portable A/C in their bedroom.)
And then flopping around all morning on said couch,
While the children have the run of the house.
I would take refuge somewhere else,
Except the car also has no air conditioning,
So the prospect of facing the hotter heat is more than I can bear.

Nonetheless, yesterday we used our season’s passes to Ontario Place,
(I love Christmas presents you can open in July,)
And met up with cousins to do the water park.
For a couple blessed hours,
There was no heat wave.
There was only the cool breeze off the lake,
And the streams of water to run through,
And slide through,
And giant buckets of water splashing down from above.

I don’t think this evening’s t-ball will have quite the same effect.

DAILY SNACK

Let’s say you happen to be a clerk at a store,
And a woman sneaks in right before closing with her four-year-old son in tow.
She asks if it’s too late to buy some cheese.
You are lovely and fetch some from the back.
All is well.
Until.
Until you look at the boy while ringing up the purchase,
And say, “I had a treat for you earlier, but they’re all gone now.”

***

We made it out to the sidewalk before his face started to crumple,
And the crying started.
Oh, for heaven’s sake, I tried to assure him.
It’s just a crappy little candy they give out sometimes.
I’ll give you a better treat at home.

***

In future then,
Do refrain from taunting the children about the treats you no longer have.
It’s not like they’re expecting anything in the first place.