Confessions of a Rookie Stay-At-Home-Parent (or, "STAHP Not Listening To Me")
Abu Halen is a professional meerkat admirer. And a professional Big Hunk chewer. He is also professionally ignorant of the rules of fencing. One thing Abu Halen is not a professional at, however, is stay-at-home-parenting. Abu Halen is, however, expanding his horizons as his household’s new stay-at-home-parent (STAHP). STAHP thinking I can’t do it (I just STAHP’ped using third-person and switched to first-person, the same way Rush STAHP’ped using 6/8 time in the middle of “Limelight” and switched to 12/11 time. Full disclosure: I don’t know what 12/11 time is, or if it exists.)
They look cute, but they’re supposed to be washing the car.
I am not going to lie, being a stay-at-home-parent is harder than it looks. You would think that to be a stay-at-home-parent, all you need to do is stay home, and also be a parent. Easy — procreate, stay home. BAM! I got this.
It turns out there is more to it than that. Sometimes you don’t even get to stay home, you have to take your tween to H&M and stand there while the employees suspiciously eye you, because you have long hair, a beard, second-hand clothes, are male, and therefore are probably a felon creeping on the teen girl shoppers. But I’m just like, “Guys, please, I wasn’t even successful with the teen girls when I was a teen boy. I mean, look at me. Let’s get real here.”
I am learning all sorts of interesting things as a STAHP. For instance, if no one does the laundry, it stays undone. Like, it just sits there and stays dirty. I tried everything to make it clean without actually cleaning it, including yelling, “MOM!! MY CLOTHES IS SO DIRTY!!” But nothing happened, which is weird because it used to work when I was a kid.
Also, I am learning that if I feel hungry I have to hunt for my own food, usually in the freezer, and slay it with the microwave. This takes many minutes that I used to spend trying to think how many times Justin Bieber says “baby” in that one song “Baby.”
Moreover, I have to hunt and slay food for the rest of the family too. I don’t understand why they can’t slay their own food. It’s not that hard. Usually the food just sits in one place in the freezer, an easy capture. Unless, I suppose, I’ve accidentally left it in there for many moons, in which case you might need to chase it a bit, then stun it with a blast from your phone flashlight, or possibly with a wicked nunchuck attack, before it can be captured and slain.
Used to be cuter.
One thing that concerns me is that my offspring don’t seem to respect my authority. I have it, believe you me. I have a LOT of it. I was just born with it. That and jaundice.
My kids don’t care though. I have a kid who spends like 45 minutes in the shower. I yell through the door, I’m like “STAHP!! Water doesn’t grow on trees!” But then my kid yells back, “NO, BUT IT SORT OF GROWS INSIDE TREES.” And then I’m quiet for a second before returning to my original line of reasoning: “STAHP!!”
Even in spite of all these setbacks though, I feel like I am killing being a stay-at-home-parent without killing any of my children. Sure, they may be not getting all the “nutrients” they need because usually I capture and slay only Hot Pockets, which I believe lack ingredients from four of the four food groups. And, sure, the house may not be “clean,” but if we think of it as a “science experiment” in which we’re “rejuvenating the Earth’s biomass,” I think we can count it as a success. My wife sometimes finishes up with her full-time job at the end of the day, looks around at the house, looks at me, and says “STAHP!!” And I’m like, “That’s my name. Don’t wear it out.”
