Dine and Dash

Before having children the husband and I used to love dining out.  We did it probably too much. There is nothing better in my world than going to a great little tapas place and gorging yourself on warm olives and focaccia with roasted garlic and flights of Spanish wine. Or brunch!  Remember brunch?! Leisurely strolling into a place around 11 and eating omelets and having a spicy bloody Mary? This has been one of the hardest things for me to give-up since becoming a parent. My kids can be pretty good in public, but they are 22 months and 3 years old, they don’t do “waiting” well. So we are mostly stuck at home, ordering in, or at best hitting a chain.

I recently read lifestyle piece in the Washington Post where the author described going out to restaurant with her kids, and an old bitty came up and told her “You’re children are charming only to you”. I couldn’t believe anyone in their right mind would ever have the gall to say that to a mother with 2 kids under 4. I took to the comments section expecting to read similar rants to the one I am about to give you. But I was shocked to find comment after comment about how her kids are coddled too much if they need entertainment to sit through a whole meal (I reiterate, they are under 4!), and how if your children can’t be quiet through a meal don’t bring them to a restaurant.

Now, gone are the days of dining anywhere with flights of wine on the menu. The best we can hope for is a place with a plane on the menu. Let’s get one thing straight: I have no interest in family restaurants. They are bad, especially as a vegetarian. You are either ordering a shitty southwestern chicken salad without the chicken, or they are defrosting a veggie burger from the deep freeze for you. But the one thing I do like about these places is that I can bring my kids there. They move fast, the waitresses know to bring the side of fruit out right away, and they have the plastic cups with the bendy straws. Do my kids make noise? Yes. But fuck you; I’m eating at Bob Evans. I don’t want to be here, I have to be here. And guess what, if you don’t have kids, you don’t have to be here. Go to the place with the tapenade if the sound of children makes you want to hurl. You elected to go to a place that advertises that kids eat free on Tuesday. This is what you get. Do see me?  The mother who hasn’t slept, ketchup stain on my sleeve, trying to show my kid how a connect-the-dot picture on the menu works? The fact I do not have to cook, or do the dishes from this meal is the one grace I get this week from an otherwise never ending list of chores.  So I dare you to tell me my kids are too loud. I would suggest you duck after doing so though.

The flip side of this is, on the very rare occasion (roughly once a year), The Husband and I get to go out sans children, and we go to the wine flight place, please do not bring your kids. I have kids, and I’m telling you, go to the shitty paper napkin place like the rest of us.