[title subtitle=”words: Stoney Stamper”][/title]
I love the show Dirty Jobs. Never mind that I have a minor man crush on Mike Rowe, I think it’s really interesting to see all of the different dirty, difficult and odd jobs that people all over the world have. From cleaning septic tanks, to making charcoal, to hauling off dead animal carcasses, he’s done pretty much every tough job imaginable, even if for only a day. But there’s one job that’s left conspicuously off his résumé. He has never been a parent. And I would venture to say that parenting, at least from my perspective, is the dirtiest job there is.
It’s also one of the hardest.
Sure, there are books you can read, videos to watch, and classes you can take, but there’s no real way to become qualified, minus having a kid and diving into it headfirst. Experience is the best teacher, but she can be a real hussy. She has neither mercy, forgiveness, nor compassion, and she has no qualms about letting you fall flat on your face. And even though you don’t have to pass a test to become a parent, and I felt absolutely unfit for the work, someone decided that me having kids would be a good idea. There was no approval certification, no licenses, no graduation ceremony. I was just thrust into parenthood, with zero preparation. And I have left a mountain of dirty situations in my wake.
My first massive failure as a parent came years before I was one. I went a long time with no children of my own, but I do have two nephews, Braden and Joby. They are my older sister Shannon’s boys and they are great. I loved playing with them when they were small, but I was admittedly not very careful. I’m big and rough and loud and I play hard.
One day, I somehow convinced my sister to let me take care of them while she went to work at the pharmacy. They were about seven and nine years old, respectively, at the time. Our first stop was the Dairy Hut to get some ice cream. Once we were all fully swollen with sugar and energy, we made our way to the local park. We played on the swings for a few minutes, but there was a merry-go-round across the park that was calling my name. One of those old heavy steel ones that had enough weight, so that you could get it spinning really fast and it would spin until you puked. They both climbed on. I told them to get a good hold, because I was going to give them a wild ride. Braden, the older brother, stood up and held on to one of the pipe handles. Joby, the younger brother, sat down with one of the pipe handles between his legs, because that was safer, and I was a completely responsible adult, remember? So once they each had a firm grip, I began to spin. I mean, I really began to spin. Faster and faster and faster, I pushed until the merry-go-round was a blur. The boys were screaming with laughter, and I felt like the greatest uncle in the world. Then all the sudden, I noticed that Joby had closed his eyes and looked a little ashen. Oh yeah, I could see some puking in his future. Just when I thought that he would surely blow chunks, he lost his grip on the pipe in front of him, his hands flew above his head and the momentum flung him backwards, with his head landing squarely onto the rusty head of an old bolt on the floor of the merry-go-round. Immediately, I knew that I had made a mistake, but it was far too late. By the time I got the spinning to stop, Joby’s head was bleeding in only the way a head wound can. Blood was running down his forehead, and all over his hands, as he held his head. I scooped him off the merry-go-round and began to assess the situation. There was so much blood, I was certain that his brains must be hanging out the back of his head. I clamped my hands over where I assumed the massive gash would be. And just like Joby, in short order, I had blood running down my hands and forearms. At this point, I was thinking of ways to save his life. He would surely bleed to death within the next few minutes without some divine intervention.
My sister worked at the pharmacy only a few miles away. Joby’s bleeding seemed to be subsiding somewhat, so I loaded him into the truck and headed to town. We rushed into the pharmacy looking like something straight out of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. My sister Shannon came from behind the pharmacist’s counter in a fervor. I felt like I was seven years old again, with my big sister staring me down like a lioness on a wildebeest. My skin felt as though it would melt off my bones as she glared at me. I’d seen this look before. Many times, actually. And usually when she looked at me like that, it was followed by a solid kick to the shins, or maybe the thigh. And it would hurt. However, once she saw all the blood, her face turned white and she had to sit down before she fainted. That was actually pretty lucky on my part, so that I didn’t get kicked.
We stuck Joby’s head in the bathroom sink and began the process of cleaning him off. The cut appeared to still be bleeding a little bit, but it was slowing down. We were finally able to see the huge gash on the back of his head. Wait, what? That COULDN’T be the cut! It was a tiny little hole! But it was bleeding so much! We finished cleaning him up. We washed ourselves off so that we wouldn’t scare the townsfolk as we walked back to the truck, and by then some of the color had come back to Shannon’s face, which was a huge plus. She even let me leave with them once again after we had cleaned his head up. I took them bowling because that was our original plan, but the hole in Joby’s noggin had given him a headache and a bit of a sour attitude, so we didn’t really have that much fun. And still to this day, that boy won’t get on a merry-go-round. I traumatized him forever.
By babysitting my nephews, I had already proven that I was in no way qualified to be someone’s legal guardian, yet, here I am. With these three beautiful daughters that I don’t understand. And I never will, most likely. Mike Rowe does Dirty Jobs, you say? Well, la-dee-da. I’m a dad. I’ve got snot, slobber, burps and farts, smelly feet, random tumbleweeds of hair floating across the floor, and of course the occasional bloody incident from a hole in the head, or a cut finger.
I’ve got the dirtiest job of all.
Stoney Stamper is the author of the popular parenting blog, The Daddy Diaries. He and his wife April have three daughters: Abby, Emma and Gracee. Originally from northeast Oklahoma, the Stampers now live in Tyler, Texas. For your daily dose of The Daddy Diaries, visit Stoney on Facebook or on his website, thedaddydiaries.net.
