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| kellywentcrazy.blogspot.com |
We should probably get this out of the way right off the
top. Parents of the world: I have no interesting in kidnapping and/or murdering
your children! None!
But if I did (and I don’t), I can assure
you, you made it very easy for me.
I volunteer at a cat adoption
center. Basically, I clean cages, let cats run around in this little room and
just have fun with the kitties for a few hours every weekend.
The adoption center where I volunteer
is located off to the side of a large, chain pet store, but I’m not affiliated
with said pet store in any way. I wear no uniform or name tag while I’m there.
One side of the room is all large
cat cages, the other side is almost all floor-length windows, so shoppers can
look in, see the kitties and hopefully find one to adopt.
How does me being nothing short of
an animal-loving hero tie-in to me not kidnapping and/or murdering children?
In my two plus years volunteering
there, I’ve noticed one thing: Parents all secretly hate their children and
want nothing more than to get away from them, even if it’s just for a few
minutes – even if it means sticking them with a complete stranger in a mildly isolated
tiny room.
Ladies and gentlemen, that’s where I
come in. Meet the complete stranger.
I can’t calculate the number of times
parents have dumped their kids in the adoption center with me and then just
plain disappeared for huge chunks of time. Hell, why pay for a babysitter when
a weird, uniform-less, name tag-less, greasy-haired guy in a pet store can
totally do the same thing for free?
I mean, that’s just good business. Miserable
parenting, but awesome business.
I’ve had parents knock on the glass
to be let in, send in their kids and then watched the adult vanish like a
teen-aged runaway, leaving me to entertain the kids.
Incidentally, this phenomenon is
significantly more common around Christmas time, which I guess makes sense
because if your kids are dead in a ditch somewhere, you don’t have to buy them
Christmas presents.
So again, business.
I’ve had kids left with me for
anywhere from a couple of minutes to over an hour. AN HOUR!
As I mentioned, the one side of the
adoption center is almost all floor-length windows. There really isn’t anywhere
to hide in there, so maybe parents feel safe.
The thing is, the windows look out
into an aisle in the store. Unless you’re in that aisle, you can’t see in. So
there is a little more privacy than you might initially think.
Also, the adoption center is close
to the store’s very isolated and empty loading dock, a storage room and … dun
dun duunnn! A back exit.
Now, see here: One of the biggest
reasons I volunteer there is that I love cats. One of the biggest reasons I try
to avoid children is that I don’t really like them all that much. So this does
not sit well with me.
What that means, parents, is that
even though I don’t plan on harming your kids in any way, I also don’t want to
watch them, either.
Here’s the thing that really gets
me.
Each week I put out a donation jar.
That money goes back to helping our foster moms care for the truckloads of cats
that they rescue.
The absolute least you could do is
slip a buck or two in there and I think I’ve only seen this happen once or
twice.
I’ve often considered implementing
my own policy where all kids must be accompanied by an adult. Sort of like the
adoption center was an R-rated movie. If a kid tries to walk in, I should just
scream: “Where’s your ID?!?” and chuck him or her out until they can find a
parent or a homeless person to escort them in.
Exactly like I learned during my movie
theater days.
But I haven’t, for the same reason I
haven’t killed or kidnapped any of the kids left in my charge: Because I’m a
fairly nice guy. Nice enough anyway that I won’t stand up for myself and tell
people to stop taking advantage of me.
Side note to parents: When your
kids are eventually killed or kidnapped by someone who’s most-assuredly not me,
I don’t want to see you on the news crying about it. Especially not after we’ve
had this little talk.
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