My wife wanted to get something off her chest today.
Every mom dreads when the babysitter cancels. Or in modern day cases, when the digital “babysitter” suddenly malfunctions at the worst possible time. How many of us need to jump into the shower, or similar, and rely on the DVR or tablet to occupy our kid while we escape for five minutes? TiVo failed me big time this morning and even had our toddler throwing her hands up shouting “Alexa, fix it!”
TiVo’s infamous “my TiVo gets me” slogan no longer applies. Because it picked the worst possible time to flake out today. So I scrambled to find a replacement “babysitter” and encouraged our nearly 3-year old to sit down and read a book. READ A BOOK! The paper kind where she can happily scrunch and tear the pages while looking at colorful pictures along mostly indecipherable letters. No, not the battery-powered kind where I ask the hubby “why didn’t you charge the iPad?”
When I walked out of the shower and saw our child reading a book it was a reminder that she actually listens and follows directions, at times, and can find stimulation in other realms — a reminder that many of us depend too heavily on technology to entertain our kids.
So my resolution for 2019 is to do less of that. To find other ways to engage my kid when I need a few minutes of me time. Hopefully I can find a healthy balance. After all, Dave is an amazing tech guru who would never allow the Zatz household to be without the newest and greatest. But babe, it’s time to divorce the TiVo because I need a more reliable babysitter!