May 9, 2013
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Strange Mamas
It’s been weird living in an area of the country where babywearing hasn’t really taken off. I mean, I’m not a hardcore babywearer or anything–I use strollers and grocery carts and car seat carriers and all sorts of means of separating my poor babies from myself.
But I do use a sling in the early months and a backpack later.
I can count on one hand the number of women I’ve seen using either in the two years I’ve been here.
The sling (which, you’ll remember, I made myself for Theo) always prompted stares and questions and rather intense conversations with perfect strangers, whenever I wore it around here. I switched to the backpack as absolutely soon as I could.
The backpack still prompts stares (more oh-isn’t-that-neat than what-on-earth-IS-that-thing than the sling prompted) and occasional comments (usually of the oh-he-looks-like-he’s-having-fun rather than the what-on-earth-IS-that-thing variety). But they’re fewer and less invasive, so I can put up with them a lot easier.
I guess I paid all the stares forward, as it were, this past week at the grocery store.
Evidently Monday morning is the grocery-shopping-time of choice for moms of infants, toddlers, and preschoolers. And all of the infants and toddlers–I mean, ALL of them–were nestled into these . . . things. My husband calls them cart condoms. They’re these fabric doohickeys that apparently protect baby from germs and boredom and, like, having to sit in an uncomfortable grocery cart.
I just . . . I couldn’t . . . I mean all of the moms were using them. Except me.
And I guess I had my old-lady-who-never-had-such-things-when-her-kids-were-little face on. Even though all the moms were my age, more or less, and all the kids were within a year of my two youngers.
I may have even sniffed at the fourteenth one I saw, although it was entirely inadvertent.
My mom-friends have since tried to convince me that they’re not entirely ridiculous. You know, babies mouthing the handle of the carts, or putting their hands where other people’s hands have been. Okay. Fine. I mean, my kids never tried to lick the grocery cart, but I guess it is normal baby behavior.
But it is weird living in an area of the country where cart condoms are all the rage and baby slings are nowhere to be seen.
