I fucking love guacamole.
If I'm at a party and someone's got some good guacamole, I will just sit there by myself and dip chip after chip into the bowl. If nobody's watching me, I'll scoop the guacamole onto a chip and just lick it off. I won't even eat the chip. I'll just keep dipping the same chip into the guacamole repeatedly. (Totally gross, right? I'm like a double dipper to the nth degree.)
Because let's face it. Chips are really just vehicles for your guacamole. They're dry, salty and taste like crap on their own. If guacamole didn't exist, I'd never eat another chip in my entire life.
Why am I talking about this? Because in the familial relationship metaphor of inter-generational dynamics, BossLady and I are the chips and Peanut is the guacamole.
Whenever we're around my parents, BossLady and I might as well not even exist. The Peanut is my parent's first grandchild and to say that they are "fawning" is to insult fawns everywhere. Peanut is their life. Their weekly schedules, their vacations, their daily conversations...all of it is at the mercy of a little 20-month-old girl.
Yesterday, we had a family dinner with my folks and MetroBro to celebrate BossLady's birthday. Though my wife's birthday is always cause for celebration, I think we've officially reached the point where my parents would celebrate Idi Amin's birthday if it meant they got to spend time with their granddaughter.
At one point, I looked up to see my father physically wrest Peanut away from the BossLady so he could carry her. Didn't even say a word. He just grabbed her out of BossLady's arms like the Lindbergh baby. I know he didn't mean to be rude. He just loves carrying the Peanut around. If it were up to him, the Peanut's feet would never touch the ground and the two of them would spend their days reenacting the marsupial relationship between Angelina Jolie and young Maddox.
During dinner, as usual, all attention is focused on the Peanut. Sometimes when I'm speaking, I can actually see my mother's mind working as she pretends to listen to what I'm saying. Although she may be looking directly at me, I know that, in her head, she's thinking, "I love my granddaughter so much. I wonder what she's doing this very nanosecond. She's so cute! Where is she? What is my son saying? When will he be done talking? I just want to see my granddaughter. I love her so much."
Like many people, I've found that my parents are far better grandparents than they were parents. Particularly in the case of my father, he seems to be atoning for various past sins and transgressions. He's already much more involved in the Peanut's life than he ever really was in my own. It's almost as if he's getting a fresh start.
Having been severely abused by his own parents, my father ran away from home at a very young age. He never had parenting role models to admire or emulate. Because he was abused by his family, he's always had problems dealing with emotional issues and has a very dysfunctional way of dealing with expressions of love and affection. My relationship with him when I was younger was always tumultuous and conflicted. Parenting was NOT a subject that I imagine he spent much time thinking about.
In several ways, having the Peanut has changed the dynamics of the relationship between me and my parents. Like everything in my life now, my primary concern is my daughter's well-being. And because I never had any grandparents of my own, I'm glad that the Peanut does. I'm glad that she gets all this doting attention. I love the fact that she has so many people who love her as much as I do.
So if it means biting my tongue as my father grabs the Peanut from me? Or sitting silently as my mother ignores me? Or going to family reunions and feeling like the Invisible Man?
Well, that's just fine for me. I'll just be here in the corner eating some guacamole with my fingers.
My mom wants to be a grandma, but it ain't happening anytime soon. At least, not with me.
Posted by: enygma | June 13, 2006 at 07:10 PM
Great post, as always, MD. You are the luckiest guy in the world--wonderful wife and marriage, fantastic little girl, and grandparents around who give a crap. Well, I guess my parents and in-laws were like that too, for the first child, during the baby and toddler stages, but now that we have three active boys the grandparents don't come around/aren't available much anymore. So enjoy it while it lasts!
Posted by: momto3cubs | June 13, 2006 at 07:46 PM
I keep coming back to this post and reading it, and changing what I`m going to say. (But now that fifty-plus others have beat me to it, it doesn`t really matter anymore, does it? And did it ever?)
My parents, too, are doting grandparents, and I think they would be content if I dropped off the face of the earth, as long as I left the grandkids behind. On one hand, it`s wonderful to see my kids get so much love, but... I selfishly wish they`d been able to spare some or me when I was growing up, or even now.
Posted by: L. | June 13, 2006 at 08:34 PM
Just today my mother got in the middle of a little marital(esque)-tiff and said "I'm looking out for the best interests of..." and Nate filled in, "your daughter." My mom said, "no, my granddaughter." It actually made me beam. There's something really cool about that.
I love the guacamole analogy btw. But I don't like guacamole. I know I should. I mean it IS fattening and expensive--all good things, right?
Posted by: Mom101 | June 13, 2006 at 10:48 PM
I've just discovered this world of "daddy blogs" and I'm very glad to have found your site. Your insights on parenting and raising a child are very interesting. As a father-to-be, I've been reading all your entries and have found them most helpful. Thanks.
Posted by: Ian | June 13, 2006 at 10:53 PM
We don't have kids yet, but my husband's sister had a daughter. His parents have lost their minds. They live in New York, their beloved grandchild is in LA. So to satisfy their baby-lust, they talk to her photo. "S. we're leaving to go buy you presents!" "Hello, S. we're home. Look what we bought you!"
His father watches a video of S. at least 2-3 times a day. When we go to visit, he wants us to join him. It wouldn't be so bad if she were doing anything interesting, but she's at the stage where all she does is beat a book with her hand and make cooing noises.
Posted by: OTRgirl | June 14, 2006 at 11:16 AM
You and Peanut better be watching the World Cup.
Posted by: Mike | June 14, 2006 at 11:51 AM
My husband says the same thing about his parents; whenever he calls, it's all about the kid. He's even been hung up on by his dad once the baby stopped babbling. But, I figure that the baby gives us a common point of discussion and helps to smooth out what might otherwise be a few rough places between all of us, so I'm also pretty happy sitting in the background munching away.
Posted by: Lori | June 14, 2006 at 02:16 PM
Use this to your advantage, MD. Drop the Peanut off with your parents and take a weekend off. We do it all the time. It's the only reason that I still even talk to my parents!
Posted by: Richard | June 14, 2006 at 02:37 PM
Oh yeah, I can totally relate! My DD is the first grandchild for both mine and my DH's sides, and she gets spoiled to high heaven and beyond! Whatever the sweet baby girl wants, she gets, even if grandma has to send it all the way from the opposite end of the US. My parents see her every week, and last week, DD started calling them Gung Gung (maternal grandfather) and Pau Pau (maternal grandmother), and they are now her eternal slaves. :) Me? I'm merely the person who works to make sure that DD is fed, alive and ready for them when they come to visit, and DH is merely the person who makes the money to put a roof over her head. :)
Guacamole. Mmmmmm. Just had a nice shmear of it with my ham and swiss sandwich for lunch.
Posted by: Tisha | June 14, 2006 at 06:24 PM
if you take your mother and add her telling you how you're doing everything wrong and your kid really loves her more than you, well, that would be my mother in law. At family gatherings, if anyone else is holding our son, she will follow them around the house timing out exactly five minutes for them to have before she wrestles him out of their arms. It's really embarrassing when we have both sides of our family over and she does it to my relatives. She's an equal opportunity offender in her obsession with my son.
Even when I was pregnant, she would refer to him as "her baby", as in "when are you going to have my baby, I'm getting impatient". Tim had to physically hold me back from whailing on her more than a handful of times.
Posted by: anna | June 14, 2006 at 08:06 PM
You all are just too adorable.
And guac? I'm going to a place on Saturday where they make it tableside...mmmm!
Posted by: Mega Mom | June 14, 2006 at 10:30 PM
"I've found that my parents are far better grandparents than they were parents."
I've experienced both sides of this. My Dad is a completely different person - doting and involved. My Mom (they are divorced) seems to have taken the opposite path. She's got this thing where she doesn't want to "interfere" with my parenting and it's just backfired into her being really UN-involved. Weird and sad. My family does not live nearby, so I envy the relationship Peanut has with her grandparents.
Posted by: PHAT Mommy | June 15, 2006 at 11:40 AM
Single best opening line of a blog...ever.
Posted by: Amy | June 17, 2006 at 10:30 AM
We have the only girl grandchild in a family of many, many boys. I would say we aren't even chips, we are a big fat spoon. If they could, the grandparents would just lick the bowl. Or is this metaphor getting too weird?
Posted by: Henitsirk | June 19, 2006 at 03:19 PM
That is one greatly written post! I could literally hear your mom's voice in my head.
Posted by: Lisa | November 04, 2009 at 05:03 AM
shoot em elizebeth ha, it is so funny. I didn't know about the show til we were up at a coisun house in n.c & they have alligators in the canal & my little nefew was talking about your show ha also a catolog to order from. Thanks Jeanette
Posted by: Thelma | July 04, 2012 at 08:24 PM
I make guac every week! (that's what happens when you live in mxeico, i guess) although I wanna try your version, with more spices.Thanks for stopping by my site! If you have any questions about your trip to Playa, just lemme know and I'll see if I can give you some insider tips haha. Love your header picture, btw.
Posted by: Zulfa | July 04, 2012 at 10:39 PM
I definitely agree that if you can't coonrtl a blade you should not be using one. Unfortunately, many very intelligent people injury themselves very badly using knives in an unsafe manner. As you know, people use these how-to videos to learn new techniques assuming they are the best way to do something. I agree that this method may be conveinient and look cool but if you are one of the unlucky ones who cuts a nerve or tendon your perspective will unfortunately change.
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Posted by: Gordana | July 05, 2012 at 01:04 AM