one very crabby mommy
If you've been looking for the AbFab of rural mommy blogs, look no further: Here's Crabmommy, a former Brooklyn mom decamped to Wyoming where she crab-parents her crabtot with serious rural panache. Just to give you a sense of it, here's the start of entry called "The Cure for Whining."
I cannot tolerate whining. From children. In my opinion only mothers should be allowed to whine. Our voices are (generally) deeper and our reasons for whining (always) more compelling. And as you know, I love a good whine. I try to whine about something at least twice a day, and indeed, I think mothers should be encouraged to whine whether it comes naturally to them or not. But children can and should be trained not to. Especially if they live in Wyoming and have rural western accents at age two. Rural western accent+carping/whinnying =appalling din.
She goes on to give actual, useful tips for shutting up your whining kid.
What she has to say about spanking is honest and interesting and certainly something people should talk more about. It's so easy to condemn spanking. Obviously, it's BAD bad. And ineffective. And not a good example. And reflective of a mother who is not ON TOP of her emotions. Etc. Etc. But Crabmommy gives her daughter the occasional whack on the leg-- when, for example, she lurches into the street, when she has, obviously, been told not to! If you're a loving mother and a guilty spanker, or you just want to read a very funny rant-- by a mother who takes the idea of "good enough" mothering very seriously--check it out. Here's a taste:
Do I “believe” in spanking? I don’t. I also don’t believe in wearing purple robes (or purple anything); nor do I believe in being mean to one’s really fantastic breadwinner husband; nor do I believe in eating lunch standing up, but these are all things that I do. And there are moments when I have and do spank Astrid, albeit not very effectively, with light taps on inward-arcing diapered bottom –the sort of weak hand-flaps that don’t do much of anything. But occasionally I slap a bare leg to sting. Occasionally I slap and mean it.
in baby | baby poetry | parenting
