Junk in the Trunk

Back in the day, there was a set of commercials for Subaru that played a lot here in Portland. They focused on a dealer-installed option of a chimpanzee in the trunk, which was activated by a special button inside the car. The chimpanzee would then spring into action, Lamaze coaching pregnant women in labor, handling lunatic children in the backseat, assisting with the officer when you get pulled over, etc. This add-on option was called a Trunk Monkey, and I wanted one bad… Still sorta do, honestly.

This concept came to mind last night as I was cooking dinner and trying to wrestle my own mental chimpanzee back into the trunk of insecurity from which he’d escaped. I could hear him scratching on the underside of the trunk lid while I was lying on the couch in a puddle of broken-toothed misery, doing absolutely nothing on my To Do List for Saturday. He started picking the lock when Melissa took my list and began to do those tasks herself in order to help me. And he finally made his big break for freedom when I heard about a conversation that Melissa recently had with a mom friend of ours who told my wife how nice it was that I had so much extra time as a stay at home mom to work on party projects for Bean. She lamented on how much more difficult it was for her as a working mother to handle birthdays because she had a job and so much less spare time than I do.

I could unpack those two sentences for days, I really could. I could expound on all the reasons why that is utter crap, all the nutso parties I did for my kids while working (ummm hello fifteen sets of mermaid tails or twenty pairs of handmade Pegasus wings) or expound, yet again, on the lengthy time demands that Pook’s medical care requires. I could point out the differences between her life and mine. I could defend myself in full-on righteous indignation, and when I got tired I’d press the Trunk Monkey button and let him have a go at reclaiming my mom honor.

I could do all that. But I won’t.

What I realized last night, as I stood at the stove stirring a pan of appropriately soft food that I could hopefully eat and not throw up, is that her comment had absolutely nothing to do with me at all. It had to do with my least favorite emotion in the world: guilt. This mom has either seen or heard about my stupidly intense list of projects for Bean and somehow translated my need for perfection into a feeling of insecurity within herself. And that insecurity on her part somehow felt better by throwing passive aggressive shade at me through my wife.

It took me a while to get there, I’ll be honest. It hurt my feelings. So I did exactly the wrong thing initially as I ranted and cried while my daughter was in the room watching. I let my Trunk Monkey slide into the backseat and start flinging poo all over the dang place. I was immature and insecure and all the things I try so hard to teach my kids not to be. And then I whined to my best friend M, who is the least immature person I know. And she told me that this was a “grade school mess” and that this woman was telling me her true colors so I should listen up.

I love my M. She always tells it like it is and is usually right. M doesn’t need a Trunk Monkey. M would kick that Trunk Monkey’s ass. She’s a keeper.

So now it’s Sunday and I still look like the human version of Shrek and can’t open my mouth more than an inch or two. No way in the universe that I’m leaving the house looking like this. No church for me. No projects and no laundry. And you know what? It’s ok. It’s all gonna be fine. I Amazon Primed an extra lock for the Trunk Monkey and he’s staying in today as well. I’m gonna rest and take a double dose of my antibiotics and drink a frozen coffee through a straw. And maybe ask my wife to make breakfast without beating myself up over it.

Not today, Trunk Monkey. Not today.

Also: here’s a link to some Trunk Monkey commercials if you’ve never seen then. They’re awesome.