October is approaching fast, and as our trips downtown get more and more disturbed by the influx of tourists in Salem, I am getting more and more used to being a stay at home Dad.
The first month has gone admittedly more smooth than I expected, and I am learning a lot about myself in the process. Fatherhood has changed me in a lot of ways that I didn't expect, and I find myself doing things that I never thought of doing before. For example, I never even owned a camera before Av came along. Never took pictures of anything, aside from the occasional camera phone shot of something funny that I would send to one of my friends. Today alone I have taken six photos of stupid faces she makes, and it isn't even noon.
I also find myself doing all sorts of fatherly things now, like going to the store with my slippers on, getting angry when the neighbors are loud and, of course, carting my family around on lame day trips.
That was the scene Monday when, thanks to Swampscott's predominately Jewish population, Mommy was given the day off from her teaching job at the middle school to celebrate Yom Kippur, thus allowing me to pile the family in to the car for a day trip to the apple farm.
Growing up in Western Mass. I, of course, have done my fair share of apple picking as a child, and my trips to Bartlett's Orchard rank among the millions of memories I have of the simple, rural life that we lead in that mysterious country west of Springfield. These memories are also the primary reason that I now live next to the ocean in a city 20 miles from Boston. Needless to say, other than picking apples, there is not much to do for a teenager out there other than drink, drive around like an idiot and experiment with, well lets just leave it at 'local plant life.'
Apple picking was something that I scoffed at as recently as a few weeks ago, when I made the comment to someone that at my age, apple picking was pretty much only good for lame family activities and taking a chick out on what would be destined to become a failed first date.
Still, when Mommy said she wanted to go, I didn't argue, as it really did seem like a nice family activity, as lame as it may sound, and I also anticipated lots of unintentional comedy from the 7-month-old goof ball that I tote around all day.
We decided that our destination would be Brooksby Farm in Peabody. A beautiful, sprawling piece of nature stuffed in between the extravagant North Shore Mall and the driving equivalent to hell, Routes 1 and 114.
We arrived at the farm shortly before noon on Monday to find the place packed with families. This was not something that we anticipated, as we figured most kids would be in school (as far as I know, only Swampscott and Marblehead kids get Jewish holidays off) and Jewish people tend to be incredibly somber on their holidays, which would rule out apple picking. (This somber Jewish holiday thing caught me by surprise. My whole life I remember holidays as an excuse to eat, laugh, hang out and watch my family- and later me- get drunk. I once had to attend a Jewish holiday celebration for the newspaper and it was the single most depressing three hours of my life.)
In any event, we parked the car, waited in line for about 15 minutes to get our apple picking bag (time spent almost entirely listening to the bitchy moms complain that the line was too long, all while ignoring their rambunctious kids) and went on our way to the orchard, which was plagued by idiot children firing apples at each other, rolled ankles caused by stepping on said apples and one sad couple who appeared to be replacing the fact that they didn't have a child with a small bull dog. Man, do dog people creep me out. Especially ones who treat their dogs like pseudo-children.
We quickly noticed that the designated apple-picking grove was not only over-populated, but pretty much baron of apples at that point, so we snuck off to an adjacent grove and stared to pick from some uncompromised trees. There were no signs saying that we couldn't be there, but there were two old women kind of hiding in the bushes who I did overhear talking about how the area was 'of limits'. They were obviously more concerned with being caught than we were, as they laid low like they were in Vietnam. Meanwhile I am holding my kid up to grab apples and taking pictures right out in the open, wondering why more people haven't figured out what we have.
Whatever the case, the half hour we spent picking apples was both hilarious and fun. We gave the baby her own apple, which she loved, and we took plenty of pictures before heading back. We never were confronted about being in the illegal grove.
Before leaving we decided to visit the petting zoo, where our confused baby got a look at a sheep, an emu, some chickens, a turkey and two pigs. She seemed to enjoy the pigs the most, but that experience was ruined by two idiot kids who thought it was funny to throw apples at the pigs, and their idiot parents who let them.
It was at this point that I realized, for all the things that have changed about me since having a child, a few things remain the same. I still have little to no patience, I pretty much can't stand children (other than my own, of course) and I think I hate parents even more.
I am actually dreading when Av makes friends and I have to do the whole pick up./ drop off, mingle with parents thing.
Our style of parenting is probably what most "experts" would consider pretty unconventional (all of you out there with 'hippie' parents, we are the modern day equivalent), but watching other people parent infuriates me most of the time. Talk to your kid like a normal human being, not an idiot. Don't make stupid rules for the sake of making rules, it just makes the kid want to break them and finally, maybe if you paid a little more attention to what your kids were doing instead of trying to out-status the other moms at soccer practice with your yoga pants, private schools and SUV's your little moron kids wouldn't throw apples at pigs when they go to the farm.
How hard is it to treat your kids like real people? I look at it like I have a 7-month-old adult, and I feel like, even though she can't talk, she appreciates me not treating her like an idiot. Just my humble parenting opinion.
That is my rant for the day. If you have kids, take them apple picking. If you don't, by all means, avoid it. Unless, of course, you have a stupid little dog you'd like to pretend is your child. In which case, by all means, slap a collar on him and hold him up to see the sheep.
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