Ask Junior if he wants a hit

Man do I love a summertime barbecue. Back home, barbecues would be in someone's backyard or on their patio. It would start in the afternoon and go on well after the coals had cooled. Potluck style, everyone would bring something to throw on the grill and/or a side dish, plus alcohol or some other mixer-type beverage. One thing not usually brought was children.

But then again, I'm talking about the barbecues of my "youth"--those years between the ages of 16 and 24. Now that people my age are settling down and having kids, it's evidently supposed to be a given that sometimes small people will accompany the guests.

Yesterday I co-hosted a barbecue in Görlitzer Park, arguably the dirtiest, shoddiest, grungiest, crummiest, junkie-est patch of grass in Berlin. It is also reknowned for its after-dark party scene, which adds to its daytime popularity. Gypsies begging and Africans slangin weed are not uncommon sights along the park's expansive corridor. Broken glass, empty drug baggies, shattered beer bottles, spent coals from previous barbecues, and copious amounts of garbage are underfoot. Add sixteen drunken adults into the mix and you have an environment that is anything but suitable for a 2.5 year old child.

But maaaaaan, was that kid cute. Oh man. Seriously. I was ready right then and there to grab the turkey baster and make sure I have one by this time next year. Watching the tow-headed toddler chase the brightly colored ball wherever his father kicked it, his long curls bouncing as he ran, listening to his joyful laughter and simple observations, I was moved. Touched by his exploratory spirit as he spun the wheels on Laura's bike, entreating his father to watch. "Look! Look! It goes faster! Look! It's doing it!" I was fascinated by his fascination, oh MAN what a fucking cute kid.

I remarked to Cookie, "But come on dude... what's he thinking bringing his kid to a barbecue full of drunken grownups, hot coals, baby-snatchers, rapists, Gypsies... not exactly a kid-friendly environment. I mean it's great that the kid gets to run around in the sunshine, but really."

Cookie just sort of nodded and said, "Well, we're getting to that age, aren't we? It'll happen more and more that people will show up with kids."

To which I replied, "Not at my party."

There's this theory that when you get married or have children, that your life changes, and you get different friends from the friends you had when you were single and childless. I personally think that's a load of bull, but there will always be assholes like me who like to hang out with grownups during grownup parties.

To be sure, when my friends started "dropping like flies", I truly did not make an effort to hang around them. We're talking about unmarried women living in small apartments with babies and sometimes baby daddies, the shit is depressing. All the girl's party clothes and paraphrenalia laying alongside toys, onesies and baby wipes. A girl in a woman's body, attempting to raise a child while refusing to leave her carefree youth behind.

I don't, of course, believe that when you have a kid you have to stop having fun. If you can afford it and you have the time, by all means, go seek adult company and entertainment. What I would kind of request though, is that you don't bring the kid with you.

I remember parties when I was all of 18 where there were infants in playpens weaving among the reefer-smoke, seemingly unfazed by the bass-heavy rap rattling the picture frames. Many's the mom I've seen kickin it downtown, pushing a stroller, smoking a blunt, and lining up her next baby daddy. To me, bringing a 2.5 year-old to an outdoor party where grownups are imbibing, smoking and cursing, as they were in the park yesterday, seems unwise. Yes, it is outdoors. No, it's not really a family event.

To the father's credit however, the rest of us at the barbecue might as well have not even existed. While my eyebrow raised upon seeing the child wading amongst the filth, Dad spent 100% of the time he spent there with his son, completely engrossed in kicking the ball for him, listening and talking to him, watching him spin the wheels on Laura's bike, hugging and kissing him, and monitoring him while he ran around a bit exploring the grass and the bushes and the bugs and the trees.

I concluded that it must be an American thing--where we work so hard to shelter our children from the realities of grownup life that they enter adulthood with zero tolerance for, and therefore heightened vulnerability to, its vices and pleasures. My parents were teetotallers and I am DEFINITELY not the better for it.

Damn Europe. So backwards, yet still so right. Sometimes.