AUTHOR: Sheri Lynch TITLE: Stop That! DATE: 7/20/2006 01:28:00 PM ----- BODY:

I hate yelling at my kids. I really, really want to be one of those parents who manages a crisis situation by very sweetly and calming saying something along the lines of, "Oh my goodness, Precious. That's not a very good choice you're making! Can you make a better choice, hmm? Let's make a better choice!" I see these people; I know these people. But I'm not one of them. My girls are rough and tumble little maniacs, a pair of thugs with cherubic faces who Do Not Listen. Believe me, they don't need me to point out that shoving a crayon into the dog's ear is a bad choice. They know it's a bad choice -- that's why they chose it. Olivia has no problem understanding that pushing her sister's face into the side of the couch is a bad idea. As a bonus, Caramia's muffled screams and flailing arms are helpful indicators of her discomfort. Yet that doesn't stop Olivia. Nor does my saying -- in a reasonable tone -- "Olivia, stop that at once." I've tried. Mark has tried. They tune us out completely until we are reduced to bellowing like fiends. Then they listen, sort of. I haven't had to yell at them in public yet. I've got another trick for public misbehavior. After much practice, I think I've finally mastered my all-time favorite parenting trick: the quiet psycho. I clench my jaws, bug my eyes, put my face a mere inch from theirs and hiss whatever the correction is through locked teeth. When it comes to keeping Caramia from swishing her toys in a public toilet, to pick just one example, nothing works better. It's funny how naughtiness at home translates mostly into tormenting each other while naughtiness in public mostly takes the form of finding the filthiest available surface and then licking it. Oh my God, the things they put their mouths on! You know those grocery carts shaped like race cars? The girls were parked in one in front of the dairy case just long enough for me to grab a gallon of milk. When I turned back around, Olivia was leaning forward and chewing on the steering wheel. The filthy, nasty, germy steering wheel. I'd rather she licked the street, no lie. I think it probably has fewer things crawling on it. My cousin Renee was so bad about this sort of thing as a kid that she actually got trench mouth. I know you think that no one ever actually gets that. It's like a parenting urban legend, right? Wrong. I couldn't have been more than seven at the time, but seeing Renee held down while the adults painted her lips and gums with blue stuff (could it have been iodine?) is seared into my memory. She screamed and kicked and cried like a creature possessed. Olivia does that now over a spoonful of peas -- how would we ever survive a bout of trench mouth? Someone I won't identify recently asked me, "Well, what if you just let them do whatever they're doing? Don't interfere and they'll figure it out on their own." Uh, hello? Are you nuts? How about if they pop by your place and "figure out on their own" all about markers, scissors, liquids, gravity, momentum, force, and bodily harm, etc? Yeah, I didn't think so.

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