What in the hell kind of term is premature potty training? What kind of sadist thinks this stuff up in reference to boys? Are they trying to give the kids a fricking complex?

I came across this wonderfully ridiculous bit of kiddie jargon at Cafe Mom, a blog that makes more money than DadWagon. From a post entitled, “Kids Aren’t Dogs: Don’t Let Them Pee in Public”:

We’re still in diapers and, admittedly, I haven’t put much time, thought, or effort into potty training my 22-month-old. So maybe I don’t know what I’m talking about here, but seriously … isn’t it just a bit uncouth to lean your recently potty-trained toddler over curbs, shrubbery, and boutique shoe stores to pee? Yes, public peeing.

They’re toddlers, not street vagrants or dogs. What’s with this public urination trend that’s taking over my city? I’ve even seen some parents cradling their kids’ butts in such a way that they can poop in public!

Color me scandalized. I mean, why bring a plastic baggie when you could just bring an extra pair of pants?

Perhaps I’m a bit Victorian in my child-rearing, but I believe a good accident can go a long way in teaching proper elimination dos and don’ts and testing your child’s readiness for the responsibilities of a diaper-free lifestyle. I believe this whole public elimination thing is a result of premature potty training.

Gack! First, I’d like to point out that if you start a post by saying you don’t know what you’re talking about, you probably don’t. Not that I mean that too strongly–given that bit of writerly logic we wouldn’t have an internet. But it’s something to bear in mind.

But back to premature potty training. I don’t really understand this. Isn’t the trend in the other direction? Aren’t we keeping kids in diapers longer than we used to? According to my mother, both my brother and I were free and easy—and peeing in the park!—by age 2. JP was tenaciously clinging to his diaper past 3, and still needs a pull-up at night (any suggestions on how to break him of that would be greatly appreciated). I know some girls in JP’s cohort who are potty trained by 2, but mostly 3 is the new 2, no?

Let’s put that aside for the moment and address the post… uh, fuck that. Let’s make fun of the way the woman posting this apologizes for potentially being too Victorian… while writing about elimination… and referring to homeless people as street vagrants… and equating them with dogs!

Classic! She’s right, of course… It is Victorian to describe natural bodily functions as animalistic tendencies best supressed.

Query: What the fuck is a good accident? What is she talking about? Isn’t the idea to avoid accidents but if they happen not to make too much of them? Is she really suggesting shaming as a form of potty training… in reverse? Anti-potty training as in support of social decorum? Holy shit, I LOVE THIS WOMAN!

Last, and to be very clear, it kinda irks me when I see kids letting it fly in the park. But, hey, they’re kids, and when they gotta go, they let it flow (rhyming!). JP doesn’t it do it, and if he has to go in public I find a bathroom for him. It hasn’t really been an issue with him, though, as he’s pretty capable of holding it. But if he really had to and I had no other choice, I wouldn’t have him go in his pants to protect someone else’s feelings.

One of the interesting notions in this sort of post, and in the responses to it at the New York Times’ Motherlode blog, which is where I found it, is that parents are supposedly expressing a sense of entitlement by letting their children urinate in public. I don’t understand that. Parenting, at least in NYC, doesn’t strike me as a way to development entitlement. Everything here is stacked against you: schools, transportation, shopping, expenses—hell, the dogs, who we shouldn’t be allowing our children to emulate, have it better in this town. Everywhere is a bathroom for them.

Frankly, if I have a sense of entitlement, I would like someone to demonstrate what exactly I am getting for it. What are the benefits that redound to me as a parent? The fact that you might get your toes scraped by my stroller on a crowded sidewalk? That my kid might kick your chair on an airplane? Is that it? That’s all I get?

How I like my Little Mermaid: In deep-fried, bite-size chunks.

With Thanksgiving just a day away and the whole gift-giving holidaymukas shebang rapidly encroaching approaching, I feel its necessary to give thanks where thanks are due. And so, to the Disney Corporation, I offer my most heartfelt gratitude. Why?

Because Disney is killing off the princess:

The studio’s Wednesday release of “Tangled,” a contemporary retelling of the Rapunzel story, will be the last fairy tale produced by Disney’s animation group for the foreseeable future.

“Films and genres do run a course,” said Pixar Animation Studios chief Ed Catmull, who along with director John Lasseter oversees Disney Animation. “They may come back later because someone has a fresh take on it … but we don’t have any other musicals or fairy tales lined up.” Indeed, Catmull and Lasseter killed two other fairy tale movies that had been in development, “The Snow Queen” and “Jack and the Beanstalk.”

Wow. I mean, wow! Just in time, too. At 2 years of age, Sasha is almost ready to start demanding to watch full-on movies, and surely Disney’s princesses would’ve starred in many of them. Ariel, Belle, Snow White or whatever her name was—all would’ve surrounded me for the next decade at least. Now, though, I—and all of you with highly suggestible daughters—have been granted a reprieve.

Of course, this does nothing for the back catalog, nor does it wipe Barbie and her ilk from the shelves of Toys R Us, nor will it stop my wife, Jean, from occasionally dressing Sasha up in princess clothes purely because she herself wasn’t allowed to wear her own princess dresses as a child.

But it’s a first step, and maybe a sign? That our culture is changing? That kids—girls and boys alike—are ready to move on from the rigidly stereotypical roles and games that Big Media has prescribed for them for decades? In any case, if my thanking Disney with a big ol’ hug-and-kiss will help stave off the inevitable, then:

XOXOXO,

—Matt

By and large I’m gonna say, Hanna Rosin notwithstanding, that it’s still a pretty good deal being an hombre, even if we have to undergo certain fundamental religious procedures to ensure hygiene (while potentially losing sensitivity).

Yet from time to time here at DadWagon we seem to position ourselves as an aggrieved minority: no one cares about fathers; women rule the household like tyrants; men don’t get equal bonding leave; blah, blah, blah.

We know it’s not true. Men still have it easy. We still get to get drunk with our babies more than the ladies; we still get to punk out on household chore; we still get to have toys the ladies and the children aren’t allowed to touch. And you know what else?

WE DON’T HAVE TO JOIN MOMMY GROUPS. Thank god for that. I wonder who thought this whole practice up? It strikes me as more than slightly insane. Consider: women with newborns, hard up for sleep, neurotic over breastfeeding, in full panic about diaper rash, gather together in cafes to speak ill of their male partners. Fun!

Worse, it seems to bring out the part of the female personality that concerns itself with disliking other women. Tomoko’s stories about getting involved in a mother’s group sound like case studies in passive aggression, tribal resentment, and bald-faced, feeding-bra-ed, cut-throat competition.

If all the mothers in a mommy’s group hate all of the other mothers in the mommy’s group, why then is there a mommy’s group?

Riddle me that friends. Riddle me that.

Listen, I grew up riding my bike in NYC and back then (we’re talking the 70s and 80s, you whippersnappers) we didn’t have friggin’ bike lanes. We rolled the dice and took our damn chances. Beyond a broken thumb and a few dented car doors along the way, I never had a serious problem. It was more a matter of remembering my place in the greater food chain: The New York City street – like it or not – is ultimately the domain of the unpredictable and easily-riled automobile. Bicyclists are guests there, and should behave accordingly.
Fast forward a couple of decades and now we have bike lanes girdling Manhattan every which way you look. While I applaud the idea behind them, bike lanes have given rise to a new breed of urban traveler: The obstreperously entitled bicyclist. Now that they have their lanes, these snippy d-bags seem to believe that all traffic must dutifully clear their path with all haste — whether or not they themselves are moving with the traffic or against it.

I don’t actually own a car (I live in Manhattan … why would I?), but every now and again, we’ll rent one and leave the city. As fate has had it, there is now a bike lane that cuts down my very street, hugging the left hand side of the road (the right being reserved for busses, fire engines and the like). The problem here is that when I’m pulling around in my car to load or unload my kids, I have no other choice than to pull up close to the curb, thereby impeding the bike lane. There are no other options. Without fail when doing so, I am routinely accosted by one uptight pedal-pusher or another, intent on scolding me for blocking the bike lane. Being that my go-to instincts lean towards sarcasm and needless antagonism (as opposed to calmly making my case and pointing out the obvious limitations of the road), the confrontations usually get ugly quickly.

Okay, so you have your bike lanes now. Bully for you. Use them wisely. But having bike lanes doesn’t relieve you from using your basic street smarts and exercising some caution and consideration. The bike lanes are a privilege, not a Divine Right.