Historical satire by Tom Hoerr. The absurd suggestions about exile and confinement are comic exaggerations, not child-care advice.
The smiling, blissful face of the average teacher on the last day of school is equalled in intensity by few things in this world.
One of them, however, happens to be the look of despondency and horror on the face of the average mother on the first day of summer vacation. It’s almost as if someone was wearing a smile button and then turned it upside down.
The reasons for each of these emotions are rather obvious.
We can all understand the teacher who, having gotten her charges through the school year and having maintained a semblance of sanity, is heaving a sigh of relief. She’s now packing her bags for Hawaii and will do a Webster College independent study on sea shells and Mai Tais.
The mother is no less easy to understand.
Her body is a little older and her spirit a tad weaker than last June, yet she prepares for the annual three-month trial by fire. Like the lemmings rushing to the sea, like John Wayne falling on a handgrenade and Rose Marie Woods erasing the tapes; mom sees her duty and she does it. Doing one’s duty and doing it well are two different things, however.
If you must bite the bullet, why not coat it with chocolate?
With this in mind, In Your Ear offers you some summer tips for surviving with your children until school starts in the fall (and the smile button is reversed once more).
1. Send them to camp.
It doesn’t much matter the kind of camp. Distance is the key criterion. Shuffleboard camp in Siberia is preferable to a soccer camp in Fenton.
If you can’t send them far away, at least make sure that they don’t know your address or phone number.
2. You go to camp. Again, distance is the key although there are other over-riding considerations where adults are concerned.
If your varicose veins make you look like a roadmap, the nudiest volleyball retreat probably isn’t for you.
3.
If you can’t afford #1 or #2, try telling the kids that they’re going to a “surprise camp.” After their bags are packed and blindfolds secured, lock them in the basement or attic.
If you don’t have a useable basement or attic, try the back seat of your car or one of the dumpsters in the alley. Naturally, these aren’t as good as the attic, but if you go this route you can at least use your washer and dryer without disguising yourself as a camp counselor.
4.
If exile, confinement, and abandonment are out of the question, that makes the task more difficult, but not impossible. Given that they’ll be with you, it’s important that they have a hobby which will occupy their time.
I have found it beneficial to create an interest in counting names in the phone book.
Not only does this reinforce math skills (the Smiths – the Jones = ?), they invariably lose count around the Hogans and have to start over.
5.
This one requires an accomplice who is also in misery. Get them their own telephone and have a friend’s mom get her child a phone. It’s amazing how kids can hang on the phone for hours, saying nothing. Who knows? Maybe they’ll become either politicians or bookies! Granted, there’s always the slim possibility that they’ll become the more unsavory of the two choices, but after all, someone has to run for office!
6. Invite your mother to stay for the summer.
After just a week or two you’ll be so irritated with her that you won’t even notice the kids (“What kids?”).
7. Have sleeping contests. Give awards to the kid who sleeps the longest and fastest (“How much can you sleep in two hours?”).
Well, that certainly doesn’t cover all the options, but it’s a start.
If all else fails and the thought of three months with the urchins has you down and out, consider the bright side: you could be a teacher and have them for nine months!
Originally published in The Paper, June 1981.
Read this article in the original newspaper issue.
Original source: SD_Times1981_06.pdf, printed page(s) 8; PDF page(s) 8.
