Mommenfreude

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

The hysterically sarcastic woman who blogs at A Lawyer Mom’s Musings coined a new word in her latest post. Mommenfreude is the feeling of satisfaction that nosy mothers get when other mothers screw up.

Personally, I think this word should be nominated for “word of the year” (Remember Stephen Colbert and “truthiness”?).

We all know these women. They are the perfect mothers with perfect children, whose kids are always perfectly behaved, whose homes are always immaculately kept, and whose husbands are always helpful and home on time. They are the ones who smile and shake their heads, ever so slightly, when you walk in, one toddler tucked under one arm, another being pulled along by the other, a baby crying in the kangaroo pouch, and your eight year old running along behind whining about some real or imagined slight from six months ago.

I have dubbed them “Mothers of Perfect Children,” or MoPCs for short.

They usually have only one child; two, tops. So don’t get too upset that your life seems to be a stack of juggling balls (some of which you drop, even on a good day), while she has time to get her hair done before a teacher conference.

MoPCs can make even the best parents feel about the size of a microbe. But before you shrink to the level of nanotechnology, remember one thing: There Is No Such Thing As A Perfect Parent.

It really doesn’t matter what her story is: you don’t care. Her life isn’t yours; if it were, she’d be two steps from decompensating, too.

My favorite Mommenfreude story:

I was driving, in bumper-to-bumper traffic, at rush hour, with all four kids and a migraine. A policeman pulled me over, because some bitch had pulled up next to him and told him my kids weren’t buckled in.

They were, of course. But I had a rear facing back seat, and the kids were hungry and tired and bored and it was late—so the two in the back seat were pushing and shoving and carrying on.

After ascertaining that my children were, indeed, properly restrained according to state law, the policeman told me that I really should try to keep them more settled in their seats.

I apologized profusely, telling him that I had run out of duct tape and the tranquilizers hadn’t set in yet.

Luckily, he let me off with a warning (for what, I’m not sure. Driving while exhausted? Having too many children? Improper use of sarcasm?). It took me almost twenty minutes to find a break in the traffic and get back on the road. If he thought my kids were antsy before…

If I had had any idea who that bitch was, it would have been worth the increase in my car insurance to rear end her (I’m so sorry, but my improperly restrained kids were distracting me…).

Send this to the person bothering you today!

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Tags: Children, coinage, driving, mother, motherhood, nosy neighbors, strangers, vocabulary, words

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