Many parents are so desperate to get away from their families that they participate in the wildly irresponsible act of leaving their children with their parents. It is a false sense of security, because your parents are only slightly more responsible than the children and are likely much less competent. When you get in that car, hit the horn, and wave goodbye, ask yourself one question: “Who’s watching who?”
I am far more worried about leaving my parents alone in my house than my children. They’re a wreck. My kids won’t open a jar of tomato sauce, pour it into a pot, and let it boil, without stirring it, until it bubbles and splatters all over the kitchen, but my mother will. My children won’t order a mini power washer and wander around the house “cleaning” every surface until the paint chips off and then declare that it feels much better this way.
The kids won’t take my car out to a restaurant, yell at the kid working the parking valet that it’s too expensive, screech off in a huff and “show him” by parking on a side street without reading the parking sign that clearly reads NO PARKING WITHOUT PERMIT and leave me with a sixty-dollar ticket, like my father did.
How do I know all of these misdeeds? Because the kids tell on their grandparents. It’s like having two living, breathing nanny cams recording everything. I’m starting to feel that we’re better off not hearing about it.
When the dog peed on the floor and my parents couldn’t be bothered with cleaning it up, they just tossed a page from the sports section at it. It sat there for several days and was only picked up five minutes before I walked back in the door. At least that’s what the kids put down in the report.
They also keep a running total of all the times their grandfather curses, which is quite a lot, and pretty much at everybody, including their grandmother. He curses so much and so colorfully that the kids don’t even recognize some of the words he comes up with. To make them feel better I told them that he used to be a pirate.
When the kids are small, you never hear about the life-risking mistakes your parents are making and that’s probably better. You just want to come home and find that everyone is still alive. You may see clues, some smeared peanut butter on someone’s face, maybe a beer bottle under the coffee table, but you don’t ask any questions. You got out of the house, had a good time, and no one is in the emergency room. That’s really all you want.
So why do I get nervous when my parents, who helped me survive, are now watching my children? Because they’re older now, not very focused, and they take a lot of naps. If something went wrong and my father had to wake up and run out of the house to drive the kids to safety, there’s a good chance his car would be gone, because he parked it in a tow-away zone. He’d spin around trying to find it and forget why he came outside in the first place, go back inside, lay down, and take another hap.
Beyond their lack of skills, there is also a lack of urgency to their job. My parents’ attitude is that they’re watching my kids, not raising them. They already went through all that worrying and trying to do the right thing. Now they’re just trying to enjoy the weekend while these kids are around.
“You want to make s’mores on the stove and stay up to watch Saturday Night Live? Does your mother let you do that?”
“Umm…”
“Ah, what the hell, have fun, I’m going to bed.”
What do your parents care if the kids don’t sleep for 48 hours, get sick, and their week is ruined? By the time that happens they’ll be long gone.
There’s nothing better than leaving for a couple of days and knowing that your children are being cared for. However, if you’ve left them with the old people, don’t be lulled into thinking that it’s a great level of care. In a lot of ways, you’d probably be better off if the dog was in charge. Come to think of it, he probably is.