I know, lets' have a Mommy War! You get on one side and I'll get on another and we can shoot each other with Mommy Arrows which are sharp but gooey with love and prone to swerve. It will be great fun! We will look very serious and intent, but in the end fall laughing into a pile of frivolity as we move on to the days next fun filled event: Toilet Scrubbing Races! All the while making sure no one's feelings ever get hurt. 2, 3, 4, We Want A Mommy War, that's how you start the game.

I am sick to death of the label Mommy War. How patronizing and marginalizing can you get? Silly Mommies, thinking their job is important, worth discussing, and valuable enough to matter. Saying there is no right way to do the job of parenting is equal to saying it doesn't matter. Saying there is no single right way gets closer to reality but remains dangerously close to suggesting the job isn't all that important.

It might be that some parents are better than others. It might be that things like how you feed a child, speak to a child, what example you provide about how to move through the world including thoughts on sleeping, working, having fun, choosing friends, handling emotions, and thinking all matter. If mothers (let's not kid ourselves, the humans discussing parenting are still 98% female) were allowed to hold public discussions about their jobs, someone might learn something. If potent meaningful words pointed enough even to hurt were used, my heavens! What might happen? Men might even get involved in such a discussion. Because it might be serious, have weight, be loaded with actual meaning about an actually valuable subject. You know, just like what happens in all those corporate offices all over the world. Where people feel the need to hold meetings to discuss options and ideas as if their very jobs depend on community verbal parlay. As if their jobs, ergo, what happens in their jobs, are important and matter.

Everyone knows what a Mommy War is. Its two women representing two groups of women, each audacious enough to have an opinion, believe it matters, and be interested in talking about it. Hum opinion having, mattering, interesting Mommies? Does such a thing exist? Can you even use the word Mommy while thinking about important choices, Sweetie, Dearie, Sugarie Pieums? Mommies take care of babies. I think our society has shown, very clearly, just how important we think they are. And since they all cry all the time anyway, who can tell who is a good Mommy and who isn't? Children barely even have mothers. What children have is school, well, for their waking hours anyway.

Important things usually hurt when they go wrong. Think of anything important. Get any of those things wrong and you can find yourself broke, broken, alone, or dead. What happens when you get parenting wrong? Get it criminally wrong and it quickly becomes obvious, ending with brokenness, separation, or death. But get it subtly wrong and what happens? Separation, brokenness, and death come much much later, after the kids are grown enough to escape. There is one clue. Getting it wrong means raising a family from which one might want to escape. How convenient that the definition of success in our culture implies independence. And how curiously circular, that our culture pushes the separation of families at every turn.

If a Mommy were ever to say an important thing, a thing so important it might actually hurt someones feelings or cause someone to consider changing, what would happen? It can not happen. If such a thing happened we would be forced to admit parenting is important and profoundly influences lives.

I'm going to tell you something, bitches. Happy babies don't cry very much. Not usually. If your baby is crying there is a good chance you are getting something wrong. Figure it out. Babies also need breast milk, science says so. Diapers aren't even necessary. But you have to be willing to personally hold and know your own baby, in order to live without diapers. You probably should hold your own baby nearly all the time, as if you are in love with them. And institutional school is stupid, it won't do a very good job raising your children. Does that hurt your feelings? Oh, sorry. I wouldn't want to say anything important. I'm just playing Mommy War. Which is all about Mommies feelings, in the end. God forbid anyone suggest a child ever had a feeling that mattered. Much less needed a parent who put any thought into how they choose to do their jobs--as if their jobs even matter.