"The Pit"

The Russ family (mostly Bekah and I) have grown lackadaisical on one of our most important rules for raising our kids, and yesterday, was a brutal reminder of why we avoid THE BALL PIT.

The summer after my senior year in high school, I took a job working at a bread factor. This job was going to be the greatest money making venture of my life. I was set to earn the large sum of $9.00/hr to simply make bread - easy enough. In fact many of the people reading this blog will remember that I tried to recruit them to join me in what I called "the richest summer ever"! I had already planned all of the things that I was going to buy with my newfound fortune, but it wasn't meant to be...I only lasted 3 days before I quit. A friend later wrote a song called three days in hell to commemorate my time at the bread factory. I would love to take some time and recount those three days of bread making genius, but this blog is not dedicated to that brief chapter in my life. What I learned as a result of quiting at the bread factory and subsequent 2nd job of the summer is the "meat" of my message.

Desperate for a job to earn some spending cash for all my "ladies", I took a job as the "Game Technician" for a little outfit called Chuck-E-Cheeses Enterprises. In my mind, I was several notches up from the lowly pizza runners that were a dime a dozen, I was 1 of 3 game technicians for the Lewisville store that also happened to have the highest play rate of any arcade in the metroplex. I was big time! It was here that I promised myself that if I was fortunate to have a child and if I wanted to be even a marginal parent, I would not allow my kids to EVER play in a ball pit. One of my main job functions, to go along with making sure that ski-ball, pop-a-shot, whack-a-mole and the various other games were in working order, was to make sure that the ball pit was clean and sanitary. The evening of my first day, the last item on my checklist was to make sure that the ball pit was clean. To do this properly, all of the balls are removed from the pit and put into a garbage bag, the garbage bag is then taken to the utility closet and all of the balls are washed as quickly as possible in the utility sink (sometimes with soap and sometimes not so much). Then, prior to returning the washed balls to their home, you were supposed to remove any loose items that had been caught in the netting that holds both child and balls. It was then that I made a startling revelation...I will never let my kid swim in a pit of balls. There starring up at me from the bottom of the empty pit were several pieces of candy, chewed gum, Barbie arms & heads (severed of course), several dozen of the "prize" toys that are purchased with the tickets won on the games that I maintained, stained netting (I would supposed some sort of concoction of urine and vomit) and...a petrified poo log! Yikes! I knew that many of the past Game Technicians apparently had not taken their job a seriously as I. I put on my C.E.C. hazmat uniform and managed to remove the debris, but was unable to do anything about the stains. My manager later told me that it is not unusual for ball pits to go several months without a good cleaning.

(Now take that same ball pit and put it in a country that routinely goes to the restroom anywhere and everywhere and dresses their children in pants without a crotch.)

Why do I tell you this story from my youth? Because yesterday the curse of "the pit" took its vengeance out on my children. Bekah and our ayi took Kate and AJ to the ball pit in our apartment complex. When they arrived, there was only one other child playing in "the pit" - fortunately for us, he wasn't wearing poopoo pants...unfortunately for Kate and AJ he wasn't wearing pants at all. You may be saying to yourself that is when you would have turned around and walk away, but you are not in a foreign country, with little else to do and high amounts of pollution clouding your mind. Before Bekah could get her wits about her, our ayi had already put the kids in with the balls. So, in violation of rule #1 in the Russ parenting book, we allowed Kate and AJ to play in a ball pit. Apparently our complex's ball pit is equipped with the latest and greatest invention...the urine slide!

Maybe in relaying this story, we can save some other children from the pain that can be caused by the ball pit. Maybe some of you reading this are thinking "of course" I already knew that about ball pits, and maybe there is another small faction that is thinking..."a urine slide - sounds fun"! This is just the latest in a string of minor disasters from our time here.

Days here will seem to be going along fine, then wham! - A BIG KICK TO THE GROIN. It happens almost every third day. So much so that Bekah and I have adopted a phrase call T.I.C. This Is China is similar to Hakunah Matatah - "It's our problem free philosophy".

And yes - I have worn the Chuck-E-Cheese costume!