The Revolution Will Be Noisy

It is how I picture the fallout of a natural disaster; people running around without any sense of reason, arms flailing, mouths open and screaming. Some grab for wheeled objects and try to ride them, others simply pick up the wheeled objects and throw them to clear a path.

Like a barn full of horses who smell smoke.

Like inmates who have never left their asylum, suddenly faced with an open door.

While the people running the asylum stand back and watch.

Yes. I took both children to the drop in gymnasium today.

Oh, Motoring Munchkins. A big gymnasium with trampolines, plastic cars to drive around, tricycles, balls and hoops, hockey sticks, ropes to swing from and best of all, other children to freak out with. Only $3.25 for the first munchkin and $1.00 for additional munchkins.

I go infrequently enough that I forget between bi-annual visits just what it is that makes my heart sink with dread when my child says, hey, maybe we could go to the gym today. I know the heart-sinking dread is serious because it has caused me to lie to the child on more than one occasion, taking advantage of the fact that he cannot yet read or use my computer so he has no idea whether Motoring Munchkins is on, canceled or having a Halloween party on any given day.

“No, Tim (the gymnastics guy) is sick with scurvy today.”
“Oh no!”
“Yeah. Pirates. So we gotta just go jump in puddles.”

Sometimes, though, there is just nothing else. Sometimes you are too tired to live. And the children need running. And you are between illnesses, so going to a place with 400 other kids, most of whom have the personal hygiene of wild goats, is your best bet for catching a rotovirus or flu just in time for the last week of school.

I love/hate it.

Love: the kids love it. They get to go batshit crazy and no one can say anything about it.
Hate: No one says anything about it. I still feel compelled to make them apologize if they hurt someone. Which means a) I have to be watching them (both) (at the same time) and b) no one else feels so compelled so I just get irritated with other peoples’ kids. And their parents.

Love: Run! Be free!
Hate: Always in opposite directions. Seriously. It was better today than 6 months ago but Fresco also ALWAYS runs for the front door just when I’m helping Trombone on to the trampoline. The front door that has a big red button you can press that makes it open. BUTTONS! Who needs trampolines when there are buttons! Screw that, have you seen this VENDING MACHINE? I have been heard to say, on more than one occasion,
“Why did I pay $4.25 to bring you here when all you want to do is stand in the lobby and beg for chocolate milk?”

Moms. They love you.

Love: No one is talking to me or asking me any questions. They just run, go crazy and uh, that’s it.
Hate: No. I love everything about that.

However, delicate flower that I am, I do hate that the noise level in that gymnasium is like 4,000 decibels above the ear splitting level and that this puts me into a sort of coma from within which I can’t make conversation with other adults, not even a banal chitchat about how old your daughter is or whether your boy likes bikes or trucks better, because I have to scream to be heard and then I can’t get the kids to stay still so I can tell them it’s almost time to go so I have to scream at them too and then they scream back, what a fun game! and then they run away and I really have to pee so I have to somehow rope them in without the benefit of actual rope and —

–suddenly I feel like I am in a war movie. And I am the loser soldier who’s going to get killed in the first battle and all these other parents, standing around casually, having conversations, knowing each other because they come here more than twice a year, they are the ones who are going to make it home alive.

It stresses me out! Some of those people only have one kid and that is just the perfect amount for one person. That is good math. But some of them have three kids and they know their way around the gym so the parents don’t have to pay as much attention (although some of them *could,* in my opinion but nevermind) and they wear earplugs, maybe? Or they’re just used to The Din? I – I just can’t get used to The Din. My kids (and yes, me too) react to The Din like a giant shower of sugar has just poured over them and they open their mouths and noses and skin cells and take it all in WOW WOW WOW and the only way to get them to come down is to go outside. Where the silence is cliche-riddeningly deafening.

(Wow, poor phrase!)

(Yes, there IS a band called The Din.)

Love: That when you leave Motoring Munchkins, you are in Queen’s Park so you are immediately welcomed back to the arms of hundreds of big, green trees that soothe you and cushion you and bring you back down to earth.
Love: Sometimes, (like today!) the children nap afterwards.
Love: Friday is the last day of Motoring Munchkins until the Fall so when I say “Tim’s on vacation! Probably in Australia with the Wiggles!” I won’t be lying. Much.