The Tale of The Battle That Was Lost

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(The Little Lady in her new car seat: that’s right, folks, she’s FINALLY big enough to be out of the infant carrier)

Have you seen the You-Tube classic, “Mom My Ride?” It’s a hilarious spoof where a mom’s brand new minivan is given the “Mom” treatment: spilled milk, scattered crumbs, stickers on the windows, coke in the stereo system, and a few nice dents in the side provided by a soccer ball.

Well, I thought it was hilarious. . . then it happened to me.

During our first year as parents, we managed to keep the car from looking like the stereotypical family vehicle. It didn’t smell like stale fries, no children’s cd was playing on a loop, and certainly no bumper stickers were bragging about our Baby Einstein on the back. No — we proudly kept ourselves free of all that. WE were going to be different. WE were going to stay adults and drive an adult car. WE were not going to let a munchkin control “how we roll.”

Yeah, Munchkins are smarter than I realized and capable of brilliant tactics and strategy. Seriously, my daughter may grow up to be a 5-Star General.

It started on Friday; the Little Lady (all of 14 months) recently decided that riding quietly in the backseat was no longer her cup of tea. Instead of our sweet quiet rides of yore, she now would transform into a howler monkey once the car seat straps were snapped in place.

After a few days of this, I broke down Friday and allowed multiple toys to be put in the backseat: her Glow-worm, two babies, a ball, a balloon, a blankie, and her Fisher Price Animal Sounds toy. It looked like Toys-R-Us had exploded all over the smooth black leather seats. All of that commercial fun was just waiting for the Little Lady. But she was not impressed. The Howler Monkey returned after just a few moments of casual play. Deafening screams and growls ricocheted off the windows. Oh, she was good.

Music was my next defensive move; I purchased two (gasp) children’s CDs. TWO! Soon, a chorus of happy-go-lucky children were telling flies to “Shoo, Fly, Shoo,” proclaiming “The Bear Went Over the Mountain,” and bragging about knowing “John Jacob Jingle Heimer Schmidt.” (By the way, WHO the heck is that guy and why is he so cool to know????)

My plan worked — the Little Lady returned to her sweet self and simply kicked her feet in time to the music. I remember smiling, full of pride, right before I looked back at her in the rear view mirror. She was smiling too — as she turned her bottle upside down and shook out pearly white drops of milk, gleefully watching the drops turn into rivers that cascaded down to the floorboard.

And just that quickly, the battle was over. As the day progressed, the Houston sun beating down, my car began to smell of rotting milk, happy annoying children continued to sing, and my daughter threw toys around. My car had been “mom’ed.”