Life Without Parole-Confusion

Confusion

You start life by somebody trying to force you through a hole the size of Pepsi bottle cap and it goes down hill from there. People are always trying to get you to go somewhere that you don’t want to go.

As a one year old you realize that you can’t seem to walk very good. Could have something to do with that damnable beach blanket they’ve taped to your butt. You try to walk, but at first you’re balance is all screwed up so you decide its easier to crawl. Mom and Dad are so excited each time you pull yourself up and stand by the coffee table, but all you want to do is figure out how to get to the toilet. You’ve had to take a good shit for like a year and it's really starting to get urgent! A little privacy is all you want. But noooo! Mom and Dad strand you in some holding pen and you are forced to shit your pants again! These people are merciless!

You’ve been realizing lately, that even though you had gotten used to the idea that you didn’t have any teeth, something seems to be itching the hell out of your gums. All you want to do is chew on something. Mom gave you a frozen cloth and you have to admit that did feel pretty good, but you had something else in mind, like an ice cream bar or one of those orange sherbet deals on a stick! A frozen rag just isn’t all that satisfying! When you express your displeasure, she gives you a pacifier that’s been in the refrigerator! Come on, here Mom! A pacifier? Why not freeze up a nice piece of meat and I’ll gnaw on that a while? The best she can do is dip the pacifier in orange juice! Damn!

When you’re two years old, you’ve recently learned to walk and run. Not always steady, but close enough for government work. Everyone you meet is telling where not to go and forcing you to go somewhere else. You want to open the refrigerator door and get a good hand full of that chocolate cake you saw in there. Mom says “No, now go play in the living room!” You don’t want to go, but you have to or else she’ll call Dad. “Honey, come and get him, he’s under my feet and trying to get into the refrigerator!” Dad comes in whisks you up and hauls you kicking and screaming into the living room. There isn’t any cake in there! You want to head back to the kitchen. Why can’t you do what you want? You’re still having trouble with your mouth. You want to say, “I’d really like to have a piece of that cake and a glass of milk!” but the words never quite get formed right. All that comes out is “CAKE! Cake cake cake cake cake!” Maybe the lips need an overhaul. Your Dad calls you “Buddy!” You want to tell him, “We’re not Buds! If you don’t give up some of that cake we’re not gonna be Buds!” You can’t though, lip trauma. “CAKE!”

By the time you make it to three years old people are starting to talk about “potty training!” You don’t know what that is, but if it has anything to do with finally getting those overgrown paper towels off of your ass, you’re interested. Mom and Dad get you a plastic chair with a giant hole in the seat. You try to tell them that the chair is defective. It has a big assed hole in the middle and besides it’s barely big enough for your new best friend, The Cookie Monster. The Cookie Monster may be a stupid stuffed toy, but when you hold it up to Mom she’ll often give you a cookie to shut you up! Cookies are one of the delicacies of life! Anyway the chair thing is not looking too promising.

Mom and Dad take your pants off and make you sit in this stupid chair bare assed naked. Why are they doing this to you? They tell you to go “poopoo!” POOPOO? Who the hell are these people and what in the hell is “poopoo?” Then it dawns on you! They want you to take a dump in the damn chair! You want to say, “Now listen, all I need to do is use the toilet. I can do a perfectly good job in there!” You can’t though, the lips and the tongue have had a collision and all you could get out was “No Poopy!” Mom and Dad take that to mean you don’t have to go and begin trying to dress you. This can’t be right! You really do have to go. You just don’t want to shit in a plastic chair with a hole in it! You try to tell them, but all that comes out is “Poopy!” Off go the pants again and they plant your butt back in the plastic chair. You are so confused. “Doesn’t anybody want to listen to me?” It’s a perfectly good rhetorical question, but not when it comes out “No poopy here!” Mom and Dad realize that they might be running up against a “location association” problem and move you to another room. After four rooms they finally get it and at least put you and the damned chair in the bathroom where you wanted to be all along. You realize that Mom and Dad are nice enough as Moms and Dads go, but they’re a couple of fries short of a Happy Meal!

By the time you’re four years old, you have finally gotten those damned paper towels off of your ass and are wearing regular jockey styled underwear. Well, not exactly regular. Mom just can’t give up on the idea that you’re not a baby anymore and buys Winnie the Pooh underwear. Winnie the Pooh? Your shorts have like Tigger and Winnie and little buckets of honey all over them. It’s humiliating!

Your lips and tongue are finally starting to work together and you have actually gotten a complete sentence out of your mouth without drooling. You said “shit” and Mom nearly fainted. You were so proud! Finally, an expression worthy of your long years of frustration! “Shit, shit, shit, shit!” Mom has been mad at Dad for days!