It’s the in thing now…

I took Gianna (age 4) to gymnastics last week. As we waited for the class to start a new girl and her mother entered. I introduced myself and the mom started peppering me with questions about the class. I was answering them to the best of my knowledge when suddenly the baby started to cry, and Charlie (age 2) made a mad dash for the bathroom. As I yelled for him to stop, she glanced down at Gianna, who was waiting patiently for me to help her with her hair. The woman immediately asked, “are all three of these yours?”

I smiled and said, “yes.”

With a slightly disapproving edge to her voice she stated, “I guess that’s the in thing now.”

Taken aback, I immediately responded, “excuse me?”

She clarified, “it’s the in thing to have 3.”

I wanted to say, oh, “I thought you were talking about my shoes.” But I just stood there, awkwardly silent.

The “in thing!?!” are you kidding me? Yeah, I have three young children because I think it looks cool. It is even cooler when one of them is crying in your arms, another is about to put his hands in the toilet at a dirty gym, and a third is hugging your legs. I have had this strange desire to be popular since high school and now I have finally succeeded. Who would have thought that having 3 kids was so darn cool.

Wow, talk about materializing our children. In an age where one boy and one girl have become an accessory for many parents, I didn’t know if I should laugh or cry at this woman’s statement. I wish she were only talking about my new shoes.