Lessons You’ll Learn When Taking Your Two-Year-Old to “Bug Day” at the Museum

There are pros and cons

Photo by James Wainscoat on Unsplash

1. If you go with the stroller, your child will want to walk all day, so you will have to manage a small, rolling SUV for no apparent reason. If you go without the stroller, your child will not want to walk all day. You will still carry two bags, plus your spawn.
   Pro: You will burn all the calories.
   Con: You need some of those to live.
2. There are no “good shoes” for this type of expedition. There are only favorable or unfavorable genetic factors like joint endurance, lower-back strength, and psychological breaking points in large crowds.
   Pro: Everyone else is in the same boat; opportunity for humorous solidarity.
   Con: Everyone else is in the same boat; opportunity for cannibalism.
3. Your child will want to play in the shallow foot pool/waterfall feature. Delightful Water Feature is designed to delight five-year-olds and older people. Your child will be FUCKING THRILLED to walk in the most slippery parts of Delightful Water Feature. They will be less thrilled when they slip and fall.
   Pro: You get to enjoy a sweet moment with your child as they hold your hand and toddle towards the pointy, pointy edge of the waterfall part of Delightful Water Feature.
   Con: You will experience four heart-related medical events while enjoying this sweet moment with your child.
4. You must exit through the gift shop while your child begs to buy all the flammable, future-mold-incubating, stuffed creatures. Your child will compensate for not getting to take these toys by attempting to eat all the choking-sized ones.
   Pro: Your child is surrounded by potentially educationally enriching objects. May bolster future career in science?
   Con: Your child is surrounded by potentially psychosis-inducing sources of brain-altering mold. May bolster future career in paranormal research?
5. There will be ridiculous people dressed up like bugs jumping around. You will be hot, tired, and in a kind of pain you cannot explain to a preschooler. You will miss the bug people’s last show by five minutes. Your child will ask you why, and you will give a perfectly good answer the first five times she asks. After that your answers will erode into pre-alphabetic, indicatory aspirations, reliant on your rate of walking and the rising ground temperature. After a while, you will realize that your child doesn’t know what the word “performance” means, which is why she keeps asking why it is over.
   Pro: Your child learns a new word.
   Con: Now that she knows what a “performance” is, she is still asking why it’s over.
6. You will sigh. Then you will notice a green caterpillar inching with great intent across the sand path. You will kneel down with your child and tell her she should protect it like baby Moana protected the baby turtle. She will understand. Some other little girls will scream about it being gross and slimy, but your child will go up to it, crouch down, and say, “Hi little guy,” and you’ll smile. Then you will finally have a moment. Your child is talking to the bug, the other children are their parents’ problems, not yours. Now that you’re still, you’ll look at your little one, and recognize that you’ve probably done more right than wrong.
   Pro: When the day is done, you’ll walk back to the parking lot, pack everything back into the car, pack your child into the car, click the car seat, start the ignition, and breathe. Feeling at peace and fulfilled.
   Con: Then she will tell you she has to pee.

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