Munch: But Mom!! I really really want these pink sparkly Hello Kitty shoes!

Toni: But Munch, you already have pink sparkly shoes…

Munch: But these ones have kitties on them, and I love kitties so much and they will make me happy!

When your kid wants something you have the power to either get it for them or not.  After all, you are the one with the money, and that green paper is just soooooo much more meaningful than the pink paper in their monopoly game.  So you have to make a choice.  Do I get them the crappy crap they want, or say no?

Of course you don’t want to spoil your kid.  Then they turn into dickholes who don’t appreciate anything.  You want them to experience boundaries, and understand the hard lesson of life that you can’t have everything you want.  Any reasonable parent denies their kid of many of their desires.  But sometimes you also want to get them things because you love them, and that is a way we express our adoration.

So there I was in Target wondering if I should get The Munch these Hello Kitty shoes.  I thought back to my own upbringing, and what my mom would have done.  She wasn’t a stingy person.  She would get me and my brother stuff that we wanted, and even got us Castle Greyskull – which was a really big deal.  I mean not everyone that had He-Man dolls got Castle Greskull okay?

But then I remembered how I really wanted “Jelly shoes” and my mom wouldn’t get them because she didn’t like them.  They were made of plastic and weaved around your feet like a horny spider.  In short, they were awesome.

My mom: Toni, there is no way.  You can’t get Jellies.  They are just too tacky for words.

Then I thought back to all the things my mom wouldn’t get because she thought they were cheesy.  Glow in the dark stars, stirrup leggings, sweatshirts that were cut around the neck, Reebok pump high-top sneakers, Cabbage Patch Kid cards (or as my mom called them cauliflower kids), My Little Pony, Pound Puppies, Jem, and Care Bears.

My mom was a generous person, but her taste was always a prerequisite.  She had to approve of it to buy it.  I so vividly remember that disappointment of wanting my mom to understand just how cool Glow Worms were.  Thank God she finally acquiesced to the Pogo Ball, because otherwise I would have run away.

So sure enough…. I got The Munch those Hello Kitty shoes (and the stupid shirt and pants to go with it).