116 3rd St SE
Cedar Rapids, Iowa 52401
Pants-free Parenting: A winter to bring parents to their knees
Dear Winter,
What with the biting winds, the polar freezes and the snow so deep even I can't play in the backyard, you make being a parent really hard. I mean, what am I supposed to do when my 2-year-old removes her underwear and starts running around the house screaming? Send her outside to play? Right, it is minus 20 without wind chill. What I do instead? I hide in the kitchen and eat Hershey's Kisses until I hear the baby crying. That's when I cross myself, pray for protection and emerge to discover all the markers uncapped on the rug, boots full of dried noodles, and a princess wand flying at my head. I don't need spring, I need an exorcism.
Winter, was it your goal to drive me insane? Because, done. You did it. With school cancellations and the extreme weather and the tidal wave of illness you've washed over my home, I'm basically one more blizzard away from a straitjacket. You win.
What did we do to deserve this? Did we not plant enough trees on Arbor Day? Was it that carbon footprint my parents made by putting paper diapers on eight kids? I'm trying to do better. I make my own household cleaner and I use cloth diapers. I mean, sure, that whole DDT thing wasn't our finest moment. And plastic grocery bags aren't great, but we're changing. We are working to fix that. I mostly bring my own bags to the grocery store. And the times I don't are because I left the bags on the roof of my car and they fell off in the alley. But we can change, just stop slapping me with all this bitter cold.
How is 30 degrees? Can we just compromise on 30? I mean, then I can send the kid outside, but you still can snow if you want to. Everyone wins. Right, winter? Just be reasonable. Please.
Fine, I didn't want to do this. But if you don't start ending this cycle of violent coldness, I am going to tie a plastic bag on every single tree in a five-block radius. I didn't want to threaten you, winter, but you forced my hand. There is only so much Play-Doh and stickers and Hi Ho Cherry-O we can play before the pants go flying, the baby starts screaming and I end up curled in the fetal position lapping coffee from my Marvin the Martian mug like a dog.
Winter, please, just go away. I want to complain about the heat now.
Love,
Every parent in Iowa
Lyz Lenz is a writer, mother of two and hater of pants. Email her at eclenz@gmail.com or find her writing at LyzLenz.com.
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