Mom Unfit to Play Easter Bunny

If you're under 13, log off now and go clean your room or watch reruns of iCarly or pester a a parent. Now SCRAM!

I'm a lousy mother. It's official. My union membership card and ID badge will be delivered via USPS early next week. If you log onto http://www.lousymoms.com/, you'll see my picture and bio between Joan Crawford and Britney Spears. No, I've never physically abused my kids. I tend not to neglect them. I feed and clothe them, educate them about finances and Jesus, hug them and tell them I love them several times a day. I put up with their never-ending whining diatribes, tack their artwork all over my walls and actively participate in the darndest converations about Wookies, Darth Maul and Jango Fett. On paper, I sound like a normal B+ kind of mom.

Tonight, however, changes my status in the record books forever. There is no turning back and it's all because I fail to plan ahead at some of the worst times. Tomorrow is Easter morning. While children all over the Christian world will be waking up to pleasant surprises of candy and trinkets left for them by a certain benevolent, world-traveling woodland creature, my kids will not wake up to gifts or chocolate bunnies, or Peeps, or fake grass, but only a couple of peanut butter eggs, grabbed by their no-good parents at Publix at the last second. There were actually six candy eggs in all, but James and I ate two, leaving two for each boy and adding insult to injury.

I didn't want to buy Andrew and Jack Easter candy because they receive way too much candy daily from every authority figure they know. Today's teachers reward kids for not dying while on their watch. "Look, Mommy, here are the Skittles I got for breathing." The dental backlash will be terrible, but I can't think about that now.

(This statement doesn't really fit anywhere, but needs to be said. We've lost the real meaning of Easter. Maybe it's time to get back to the cross and empty tomb and Jesus's sacrifice for our salvation. Okay, statement over.)

I wanted to buy them something sensible. Not like socks or underwear but something they'd been needing, wanting for a long time. Jack needs a new bike really badly and Andrew has had his eye on the new Super Mario Bros game. (They haven't had anything new since Christmas, so I didn't mind splurging just a tad on Easter.) The Dublin Wal-Mart was out of Mario and all his relatives and had no boys' bikes at all. No one who works there cares. This is a store built with 30 checkouts, yet has only three open with 37 people in each line at any give hour. It reminds me of those grainly black and white videos of Soviet bread lines.

Since I knew we'd be at Tybee over Easter, I'd just run out to the Wilmington Wal-Mart Saturday night and pick up their treats then. It has only 12 checkouts, but four are continuously open, more reminiscent of a Khazakstanian mutton line, slightly more progressive than the former USSR. Why, oh why did I wait until Saturday night? Why did I naively, stupidly assume that both the bike and the Wii game would be there waiting for me?

I'm sure by now you've figured out that my shopping trip was not a success. It ended with much cursing and gnashing of teeth, like Dante's Divine Comedy without the fire. Wilmington Wal-Mart didn't have Super Mario Brothers or fathers, or ex-step sisters, or former college roommates. (We just decided to give Andrew a some money compliments of E Bunny.) They did, however, have our chosen bike. It was outside in front of the store connected by steel cable to 873 other bikes ranging in size and price with names like Mongoose, Trixter, Dirt Skid and Street Diva. James and I waited and waited and waited for someone to come out and unlock the black and red dirt bike model for Jack. By the time Assistant Manager Craig arrived on the scene, it was 9 PM and my 16-hour deodorant had clocked out and gome home.

Craig was a friendly, 40-ish balding guy with just a hint of sliminess and a keychain that contained 560 keys from his past life as a car thief. He tried the first key in the lock. Nothing. Second. Nothing. Third. Nothing. Fourth. Fifth. Sixth. Seventeenth, Twenty-ninth, Eighty-fourth, Five Hundred Sixtieth. Still Nothing. I began to mutter complaints of life being unfair. James asked to no one in particular "are we having fun yet?"20 minutes of unlocking failure passed before Craig finally called the store manager, Velma to the scene. After his third attempt to radio her, Velma, all 400 pounds of her, emerged smelling of barbecued ribs, with sauce smeared on her cheek and a dirty napkin wadded in her hand. I thought I recognized her from a recent TLC program, Supersized and Pregnant.

As Velma squatted down to unlock the cable, I felt the Earth's tectonic plates shift. In no hurry whatsoever, she tried key number one... two..... four.... nine...twelve. Thirteen was a charm, the first time it'd ever been lucky in its entire life as a number. "YAY," I shouted. James pumped his fist in the air with a resounding "Yes! Now we're getting somewhere." Craig stood distracted, cleaning his fingernails with a Hyundai key.

When Velma tugged to free the cable, she yanked a little too hard. The Mongoose fell into the Rally Rider, which in turn tumbled into the Trixter, which set off a chain. We all watched as the bikes, like dominoes, crashed sideways onto their neighbors. 15 more minutes went by while we dug through the chaos to pull out Jack's Huffy, the only one they had of that model.

As our saga wound to a close, James began rolling the prize we'd fought for with patience and perseverance toward the checkouts. That's when I noticed that its back tire was flat as a pancake. A bitter, incredulous laugh escaped as I pointed out the malady. Upon examination, we found that the rim was bent and the tire didn't fit it properly and would never hold air. As if on cue, we both threw up our hands and walked away, leaving the rejected little bike alone on the sidewalk.

That's when we walked over to Publix and purchased the last six pieces of Easter candy in the store. "I feel like a failure. What are the kids going to think in the morning?" I moaned. James, always the practical one, responded "Isn't it enough that you gave birth to them, and feed them every day and they're disease free and not sitting in refugee camps or sold into slavery. Have those little ingrates even said 'thank you' for that?"

"I'll remind them tomorrow," I said.

I stopped believing in the Easter Bunny when I was eight years old. It wasn't because my parents felt I was mature enough to let go of my silly attachment to mythical gift-bearing woodland creatures. It was because my mom forgot to go to the store and buy Easter candy. That Saturday night, as she was ironing my Sunday dress, she causually looked over at me, sitting on the couch, watching The Love Boat, and said "Honey, ya know there's no such thing as the Easter Bunny, Right?"

"Uhm, no Mom. I didn't know that. Is there any other life destroying information you want to give me? What about the Tooth Fairy? And Uncle Robin, who's serving a life sentence in the state penetentiary. Is he not real either?"

"Don't be a smart alec, Angela. I forgot to go to the store. But here's a chocolate chip granola bar I found in the pantry. You can pretend it's a chocolate bunny." So I did. Since then, I've had a sentimental attachment to granola bars and anything else made by Quaker Oats for that matter.
I wonder if I'll have a similar conversation with Andrew and Jack tomorrow. God NO! I'll make every excuse in the world for the Easter Bunny's absence. He got stuck in freeway traffic, kidnapped by Somoli pirates, locked up on DUI charges in Downtown Savannah. I'll think of something. Yes, it looks like I've got some 'splainin' to do.