I was doing laundry the other day, and I began to wonder what it is exactly that people who have a full-time staff of maids, chefs, butlers, nanny’s, personal assistants, spiritual advisors, chauffeurs, and the like, actually do all day every day? If anyone reading this has such a staff, please have one the previously mentioned folks give me a call. When your work is done of course.

I don’t care to talk to you personally, I’m sure you’re busy making business for your staff. Sweating in your socks, using more forks than are necessary, not changing the toilet paper roll…making work for others is a lot of work. Come to think of it, that way of life isn’t far removed from the way of life most children lead. Those little tyrants just have a smaller staff to command. Mom and/or Dad.

Maybe that comparison is telling as to just what people with a full personal staff do all day? Spill juice on the couch, eat crayons, yell a lot, and lose their mind when there aren’t any hotdogs cut-up in the macaroni and cheese. They don’t concern themselves with toilet paper either, we’ve got that end covered as well.

I have no sense of smell, for those that do crossword puzzles or play Scrabble, the medical term for it is anosmia, might get you a win someday. Anyway, when our children were diaper age, and said diaper was at or beyond its intended capacity of digested macaroni and cheese (no hotdogs), my wife would sometimes say, “Oooh…this is bad one. You can have it, you can’t smell.”

I didn’t argue (much), it was the least I could do after witnessing the “miracle” of childbirth. The real miracle is that women hang around the likes of us men folk after enduring something like that. I’d have ran off and joined the circus, cleaning monkey cages and laundering their little outfits. On second thought, that’s pretty much what happened. Except the monkey cages probably would have been nicer than our first apartment. So it goes.

Back to my harrowing story of macaroni and cheese, diapers, and crippling anosmia. Having never experienced sniffing around something that seems should be left unsniffed, I have no reference for proper comparison, but my vision is fine. I assume that eventually you can “unsmell” something you wished you hadn’t had to smell, but it’s been about 20 years, and I still can’t “unsee” what I wished I hadn’t had to see. As my dad always says, “Wish in one hand…..”

All these things we “get” to do for our little miracles, are not things I’d pay someone else to do for me. For one, I’d feel so ashamed of myself for them having to do some of those things while I perused my ascot collection, that I’d have to fire them. The kid would have a fresh diaper to work with, but the nanny would be out of job. Maybe that’s what these people do with their time? Hire and fire diaper changers, and buy ascots.

I miss most everything that came with being a dad to little one’s…most everything.