When All Else Fails, Try Humor

I'm hardly the first person you'd coming running to for parenting advice.
Before my son was born, I'd never even diapered a baby.
When I found out I was pregnant, I began practicing on my pet Pekingese who was amazingly tolerant when I'd get the sticky tabs of the Pampers stuck to his fur.
After a few dozen attempts, I became pretty proficient at diapering a Pekingese. Too bad my son wasn't born with a tail.
A lot of women are born mothers. I'm not one of them. I felt inadequate more times than not. I kept waiting for someone to accuse me of being an imposter.
A few came close. Like the time I walked out of the grocery store pushing my cart filled with bags only to hear the cashier yell after me, "Hey, lady, you forgot your baby!"
Sure enough, my sleeping infant was snuggled in his carrier, which was attached to the seat of a different shopping cart.
Luckily, Ian was oblivious that time. He caught on when he was a little older, though. There was that horrifying moment my husband and I rushed from our jobs to attend his kindergarten open house. We arrived at the same time, looked at one another and realized neither of us had picked up our son from preschool. I rushed over to get him. He was waiting, hands on his hips.
"You forgot me again, didn't you?" he said, sighing. I made him promise this incident wouldn't send him into therapy when he's 30.
Of course, wise beyond his years, my son relished bolstering my sense of inadequacy. As soon as he learned to talk, way too soon as far as I was concerned, he delighted in causing me public embarrassment.
One day he threw a tantrum in the grocery store because I wouldn't buy him a toy in the toy aisle.
I explained to him that the grocery store toy aisle is simply a marketing ploy designed to torment harried mothers into buying overpriced plastic army men for spoiled children. But the decibel of my son's screams rose to ear-piercing levels, attracting tsks from elderly women who had apparently raised perfect children.
Reaching the limits of my patience, I firmly grabbed his chubby cheeks, ordered him to shape up and dragged him away from the toy aisle.
As we were standing in line waiting to check out, he announced to anyone who'd listen, "My mom is a face-hurter, and a hand-squeezer, too!"
I wasn't really surprised when Ian graduated from preschool with the dubious class title of "Most Irrepressible."
I recalled these events as I drove to the hospital to visit a friend’s newborn baby. And I pondered what advice I might offer the new parents, not that they'd ask for my advice so it'd have to be unsolicited.
First and foremost, I'd tell them to find the humor. Laugh at discovering you've been walking around all day with a glob of baby vomit on your shoulder.
Secondly, watch what you say. Although they may not seem to be listening, kids will regurgitate the most unlikely comments you make at the most embarrassing moments.
I remember cringing at the beach when my friend's 5-year-old daughter ran up to us sobbing. "I was poking a stick at a horseshoe crab and Ian told me I was going to grow up to be a serial killer."
My final suggestion is to have answers prepared when your child starts asking life's big questions, somewhere between ages 2 and 5. Keep in mind that kids don't necessarily want a technical explanation or scientific theories. They just want a simple answer they can wrap their little brains around.
Feel free to borrow my answers:
Why is the sky blue? Because God used a blue crayon.
Why did He use blue? Because He'd already used his yellow crayon for the sun and His green crayon for the grass.
Will there ever be dinosaurs again? (Trust me, they aren't interested in a theory about the Ice Age). Yes, they'll be back on Tuesday (kids this age have no concept of time).
Why do people go to war? Because they don't know how to share with their friends (that way you slip in a moral lesson at the same time).
Why do people wear clothes? (Avoid a lengthy diatribe about Adam and Eve. Kids' attention spans aren't that long.) So they don't get arrested.
Why don't dogs wear clothes? Because they want to get arrested. (OK, I didn't have time to think that one through).
What do grownups do after kids are in bed? We play with your toys.
Where was I before I was in your tummy? You were in God's tummy.
Where was I before I was in God's tummy? You were a prayer. (Spiritual explanations are always good because they can't be disproved. He won't come back when he's 17 and call you a liar.)
Why do grownups work? So they have an excuse to send their kids to school.
Is there life on other planets? Yes. There's some little alien child in the universe right now annoying his mother with endless questions.