Controlling your unruly children

Waiting tables has enabled me to develop such an unbridled hatred for children that it's a little ridiculous. But, I guess it's not really the children. It's the parents. I hate parents.

I had a table tonight whose children threw garbage everywhere, threw temper tantrums when they didn't get ice cream for dinner, ran around and dangled themselves all over the chairs, cried and yelled, and were just generally unpleasant for the two hours that they sat in my section. They did not say please or thank you. They did not behave. At all.

I don't have kids, so for some that disqualifies me from giving advice about raising children. Well, no, I don't have kids, but I once was one of course, and I can easily recall the way my parents taught me how to act in public, and I can certainly tell when your kid is acting like a demon in my restaurant. When my parents took me out, I was told to keep my mouth shut, not to fidget, not to get out of my chair or cry, and to eat my dinner quietly while letting the adults talk and enjoy their evening. If I didn't do those things, my parents would threaten to leave or that they'd give me a spanking. I know that spanking is frowned upon these days, but I can tell you from experience that it was really the threat of a good beating that kept me in line, and I didn't turn into an axe murderer or sociopath because my parents did it. You may have the heart to beat your kids, but I assure you that the other 40 people in the restaurant would gladly volunteer to help you out.

Here's the thing. It's not just me your kids are irritating. My other tables - adults who are trying to have dinner and enjoy each others company - cannot hear each other over your child's screaming, do not appreciate your kids running around and throwing things, and do not find the garbage and food they are throwing around cute or enjoyable. You're ruining my night because I have to deal with and subsequently clean up after you, but more importantly, you're ruining the night out for those around you. That's what really makes it shitty. Some people don't have a lot of money and they don't get to go out to restaurants very often. Do you not consider that your tantrum throwing little punk is screwing things up for them? Of course you don't. Kids are kids, you say. They're fine, you say. Because you're enjoying your dinner and completely ignoring their shit. You've learned to tune it out. We haven't.

One time, I had a table whose children were running around and crawling all over the floor, under the tables and basically just running amok throughout the whole section of the restaurant. There's a wall that separates that section of the restaurant from the bar area. Another server was coming around the bend, carrying hot plates of food, not expecting any wayward children to be laying around on the floor. So, as he turned the corner, he tripped over a child, accidentally kicking him in the head and spilling plates of food everywhere. The child began to bawl, and the table whose food was now inedible became pissed as hell. The parents response? A rushed and empty "sorry" before they turned back to their plates and continued eating and talking. "Oh, he's fine," they said, ignoring their sobbing child until he stopped and went back to playing around on the floor. What is this? I don't even know what to say to that.

I've had children falling asleep at the bar while their parents sat and got drunk, a mom and her boyfriend get into an argument and ask me to watch their kid while they went out in the parking lot and yelled at each other, parents who let their kids order all kinds of shit they'd never eat...so many things. The awful parenting I see on a day to day basis makes me want to call child services and chug gallons of vodka with my birth control. I can't even begin to tell you all the stories I have on this subject.

I do particularly hate parents who give in to their child's every whim, however. I had a table a few weeks ago - it was a mother and her son. I asked them what they wanted to drink and the mother ordered for herself and then asked her son what he wanted. "Cranberry juice," he said. "But you don't like cranberry juice," she said. "I WANT CRANBERRY JUICE!" he said. So she tells me to bring him the cranberry juice. I bring it to the table, he takes one sip and says, "I don't like this." So the mother has me bring him orange juice. There are a couple of problems I have with this situation. First and foremost, I'm fucking busy. I don't have time for this shit. But now I've not only wasted my time, I have wasted perfectly good juice, and you have no backbone when it comes to your kid. Lady, you know your kid doesn't like cranberry juice, you are the adult, you tell him NO. Parents these days are too lax and have no authority over their kids. That's not gonna work out too well in the future, and that's not my problem really, but fuck you for wasting my time. When I was a kid, my mom would order for me. If she let me order, she gave me two choices and told me to pick one, and if I didn't, she'd order. There was no making the waitress sit there while I huffed about it. That shit didn't happen, because it shouldn't happen. Be the parent, goddamnit.

Parents are ignorant doormats sometimes and it drives me fucking bonkers. Don't be that parent. And please, please don't be that restaurant patron.

And if you do let your snotty little kids make a huge mess, you either help clean it up or you leave me a bigger tip. I'm your waitress, not your housekeeper. I work at a restaurant, not a fucking Chuck E. Cheese. Don't be an asshole.

Parents can just go to hell, really.

J

PS - I forgot to mention one of my biggest restaurant pet peeves. Parents, please note that the sugar caddies, ketchup, table cards, salt and pepper, etc. are NOT ON THE TABLE TO ENTERTAIN YOUR KID. Kids are basically little germ factories and those sugars and salts are things that other people are going to eventually eat. They are not toys, and if your kid needs shit to play with, then bring something with you to keep them entertained. When all the sugars get thrown on the floor, guess who gets to pick them up? And guess who isn't getting a bigger tip to crawl around in such a fashion? Fuck you.