Never take your babies to the mall.

Posted on | March 3, 2008 16 Comments | e-mail | print

Oy! I always think it will be an enjoyable capitalist experience but it always makes me nauseated in some form or another. So last week, at my wit’s end, I remembered that the Murder Mall (where that professor guy was shot in the parking lot) has an indoor playground called Tiny Tot Town or somesuch saccharine swill. I promptly readied my offspring for the trip and, two hours later, when everyone finally had no urine stains on their pants (I’m not naming names, here, PRESCHOOLER), we set off.

Here’s what you do. You got to park on the fourth level, because that’s the level the Apple store is on, and you cannot go to the mall without stopping to lay some drool on Steve Jobs’ babies. Unload the stroller that is almost as big as your sedan. Do it without injuring yourself this time. Unbuckle the preschooler from his car seat and force him into the stroller. Walk around to unbuckle the baby and realize that he’s finally fallen asleep in the seven minutes it took to drive here. Do you: resign yourself, fold your child, your stroller and yourself back into the car and drive around aimlessly for two hours so he will remain asleep? No. You are out of gas. Also, peckish. The baby will survive.

So you unbuckle the baby as gently as humanly possible and carefully set him in the stroller, which, by the way, is not a double stroller, because you are a cheap bastard and those things are like $200. It is a stroller meant for one kid but you always fold the seat back so you can squash both of them in there and no one has arrested you yet. So you gently, carefully, quietly lay the baby in the back of the stroller, with each leg gently resting against the preschooler occupying the forward space, and thank God that he didn’t wake up. Lock the car so that no one will steal your cheerios and mismatched mittens. Turn around and see that your preschooler is plonking his Star Wars Sand Trooper against the baby’s (red, wailing) face.

Restrain yourself. You may wish to leave the parking lot for this, but you should probably stay near the kids.

Still with me? Now you have to get into the mall. Sometimes you’ll get lucky and hoodlums with a conscience will be smoking near the entrance, ready and willing to hold the double doors for you and your Continental of a child-moving device. But usually it is hairstylists on a smoke break, and they don’t hold doors. Fortunately you are lithe. Bend backwards, grasp the door with your left hand, push the stroller with your right, and tell your children to keep their legs, arms and heads inside the vehicle until the ride comes to a complete stop. Inevitably, someone will be mildly injured, but it is nothing that several Gerber Puffs won’t amnesiate.

Amnesiate.

OK! Onward! It’s 12 noon and you are famished, and you promised the preschooler a hotdog, and the baby doesn’t understand why he’s being jostled about. Head to the food court. But brave the Elevator Button Tantrum you know is coming — it’s best just to let him push it a few times, and then, when he’s distracted, push it firmly yourself so the car actually arrives. Head on down to Boardwalk Fries. Order the hotdog, and some french fries. And a coke. And for dog’s sake, get the nacho cheese for dipping. I would recommend ordering a beverage for the kid, too, because once you’re seated and have the baby in the high chair and the preschooler half-undressed with a napkin tucked into his t-shirt, there is no getting back in line.

Feeding children at a food court is no more difficult than feeding them at home. Mind the adolescent girls, though. They will make funny faces and talk in pipsqueaked voices to the kids, flirting and cooing. They will ignore you completely but your children? They love. Which works out because they keep the kids occupied while you wolf down your fries. Here’s a tip: Make sure your lunch is not the same color as your baby’s baby food. Otherwise you will, without fail, dip your french fry into Gerber Stage Two Sweet Potato Casserole rather than the nacho cheese God intended. You can’t spit it out, either, because you are in public. At a food court. Where teenagers and security guards are. Also, I suppose that would be gross. I guess.

Make sure you take three times as many napkins as you feel comfortable taking. Take an embarrassing amount of napkins. You will use them all and want to steal more.

When everyone is fed, it’s time to wander aimlessly along the third level, hoping for an elevator that will take you to floors one and two. Hint: It’s by Nordstrom. This will let you out near H&M, where you can laugh at the skinny young people buying fashionable clothes that will remain unbarfed upon for hours, and then only receiving barf that has a high Jack and Coke content. On the inside, they are jealous of you and your sturdy hips, and your practical shoes. It’s best not to remind them of what they are missing. No, press onward: cock your ear for the headsplitting shrieks that herald the open doors of Tiny Tot Town and its Tiny Community Association. Park your stroller, but don’t leave anything of value underneath it, because frankly, I don’t trust the kind of people who take their children to a mall playground. They’d probably get fake cheese on your Graco, maybe steal your diaper bag. I realize that I consume fake cheese and take my own children to a mall playground but at least I am not conducting cold calls to international residents like the ponytailed man sitting in the corner, taking notes on a clipboard and not even pretending to be watching over a kid. He must rack up some kind of minutes on that phone of his. (“Is this Maria? Maria? Is there a Maria there? Maria. Is there one? I’m trying to reach a Maria?”) Don’t sit next to that guy.

Otherwise, it doesn’t matter quite where you sit, because this place has zero visibility. Kids are hanging from the rafters but you can’t see them. There’s some sort of bend in time-space, maybe a mirage/light refraction thing going on, because no matter where you sit you will not be able to see more than three feet on either side of you. It might be better if you remember to bring a bell to tie around your preschooler’s neck. If you don’t hear it jingling, you’ll know to alert mall security.

Oh, and just when you remove your kid’s shoes and shove him off into the jungle of strange, germy, strangey kids, your other child, the baby, will just … how can I euphemize this? He will drop one. A big one. The smell alone will alienate other parents from your bench.

You have two choices: Pretend it didn’t happen, leaving your precious infant to stew in rash-causing matter. Gross. Or, change him right there, knowing the risk of getting diaper-blowout poop everywhere. Also gross. You could call that diaper Morton’s Fork. I leave the decision up to you, as an individual, and your public-poop comfort level.

Once you’ve made peace with your decision, try to find your kid so you can take a cameraphone shot of him having a good time. You’ll be able to wield it as proof, later, when your spouse wonders why you let the kids watch so much TV — because getting them out of the house is a motherfucker, that’s why. Only, guess what? You can’t find the kid! I told you to bring a bell.

This portion will get your heart racing and really test your reflexes, because you’ll need to hang on to your baby as you run around the Greater Metropolitan Tiny Tot Area, panicked. Don’t worry, your kid is safe. He is laying on his back at the foot of the slide, having some sort of moody, adolescent crisis because the boy in the cool Ravens jersey isn’t playing with him. Tip: Never let them see you sweat. Kids can smell fear, as you know. Pretend you were just going to remind him of how much fun he’s having; otherwise, be prepared for a meltdown. Actually, prepare for a meltdown, regardless. In T-minus three minutes, your baby is going to finally vocalize his opinion of a napless afternoon, and you are going to have to convince a preschooler at the zenith of a good time to put his shoes on and go home.

It’s time to withdraw the troops before further casualties occur. Once the screaming subsides, package the kids up in the stroller and aim for the elevator. Kick yourself for parking near the Apple store, which will taunt you with teeny, glossy, touch-screened sirens. Kick yourself for spilling the last of your Coke. Kick yourself for — oh, any number of things. But the kicking can wait until you’ve figured out a way to get you and your precious cargo up three floors and out the double doors without causing harm to innocent bystanders. If you can manage that, I’ve got a country for you to run.

Or at the very least, two precious children for you to baby-sit.

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