Groovy Sputum

The Vices Of Our Day

The flu has been making the rounds in our family this week and Valerie is not feeling too well today, so I decided to take the opportunity to change the Saturday morning routine a bit with the kids. Normally, Valerie will fix breakfast and then the morning is a mix of cartoons, grocery shopping, or playing. I decided to dive headlong into some chores promptly after breakfast. I served up “dunky” eggs & toast, with bananas and apples, by the way.

The first item of business was to tidy up the kid’s bedrooms. This consisted of throwing away diapers, picking up trash, removing who knows what from under the beds, putting dirty cloths in the hamper, and putting toys, books, and shoes in their proper places. You would have thought I was a slave driver when the kids heard me ask them to do this. “Just because mommy is sick doesn’t mean that everything has to change,” cried one kiddo. “I never do anything but clean,” cried another. I quickly asked my children if they ever played with their toys, read books, watched tv, or played games on the internet, to which they were silent. “But it will just get messy again,” objected another child. “Yes, it probably will,” I replied, “but having nice things means taking responsibly to take care of them.” I was feeling pretty confident with my calm composure and insightful responses. “If you don’t want to take care of them, I guess I can pack them up and give them to someone who will,” I said. Needless to say, a few moments later four grumpy kids were busy in their room. We managed to get the bedroom straightened up and I even swept the floors of the main living area during this chore time as well.

My mix-things-up-because-mom-is-sick plan continued after chore time by having the kids put some puzzles together and having a short story time. I read the story of St. Valentine. It was pretty nice, but I couldn’t help get a bit tired of the kids griping and complaining. They weren’t outright asking to watch tv or veg in front of the computer, but I sensed that that was their ultimate desire. Sure, they enjoyed the puzzles and the story, and I think they appreciated having a tidy home, but given the choice, they would have chosen technology time.

That’s when it hit me: things have got to change. I know that we don’t let our kids watch tv or play on the computer as much as the typical household, but my kids still craved it and felt gypped if they were denied these things. I felt kind of hurt to know that my kids would rather spend time with Dora or Club Penguin than with me. Actually, it’s not just that…it’s that they seem to enjoy those thing more than they enjoy me. Punch me in the gut a bit harder, will ya?

So, I am taking a stand. Things are going to change around here. Sure, we will still have family time in front of the tv with Andy Griffith, The Waltons, and Little House, but we are going to stop using PBS and Noggin as a childcare provider. From now on, activities in this house will require personal interaction and not just be a client-server relationship. It isn’t going to be easy, but I hope that once the addiction is broken, my kids will want to do things with me first and the technology based entertainment will be something I have to force them to engage in.

Wish me luck.