Electronic Babysitting

Mr.G: “Is it OK for him to be swinging for so long?”

Mrs.G: “I didn’t find anything against it online”

Mr.G: “Tell me you didn’t look at just the Fisher-Price website”

OK so I didn't look too hard. But we all grew up in those jhulas ourselves didn’t we? They are omnipresent in a household with babies, every once a while spilling over to non-house locations too (Recall Indian Railways, any class, as long as you have parallel sturdy berths, there’s a sari/dhoti make-shift jhula quickly knotted up and in no time, a blissful baby can be found fast asleep inside)

Five years from now, for the Maharaja’s sake, I hope and pray some random study doesn’t end up with this in-situ result showing a close relationship between slower kids and the ones that spent an unmentionable number of hours in the Fisher-Price Nature’s Touch™ Baby Papasan™ Cradle Swing. Because this swing rocks. Not just in the way swings are supposed to but as in “It ROCKS my world”. It allows me to shower, eat, watch TV, talk on the phone and need-I-say, blog! It allows Gabby to catch up with her whole other non-mommy life and doesn’t make her feel like a bad mommy one bit. The baby is napping, and that’s good for him, isn’t it? He smiled in his sleep too, there you go.

I suspect my thoughts on this approach to buying oneself some time would have been very different 3 months ago. Let this be a lesson to me and to the person who grimaces at short-cuts in parenting, at crying babies in crowded flights (you feel cramped, bored and impatient yourself don’t ya?), the person who raises one eyebrow at pacifier-happy babies, who wonders about the need for security blankets in a disapproving tone or who wishes family-friendly restaurants mean you can bring your child but check him/her in with your coat at the door. You really need to be on the other side of the fence for this one.

Now when I pass mini-vans with purple dinosaurs dancing in the darkness, I don’t cluck my tongue or shake my head. Instead I wonder if these can be coupled with vibrating car-seats. You know, to cover the transitional stage.