Babies at Bars

Say what you will about Millenials, but hats off to them for figuring out how to have your cake and eat it too.  Or rather, how to have your beer and drink it too, I should say.

Been to a brewery lately? Notice how it’s overrun with parents with young children?  I look at them with a weird combination of kudos, envy, and horror.

First, I’d like to understand how this trend began.  Is there some underground network of Millennial parents sending out the word that this is a new thing they should all try? I imagine the communique would look something like this:

Attention all parents with children aged 6 and under.  Unable to find a babysitter? Tired of being stuck in the house? Tired of the playground scene? Wanna have a little of your own fun while they also get to run around and have fun—what we call a win-win?  Try bringing your kids to a microbrewery!

Actually, I am showing my age.  It wouldn’t be an underground communique.  It would be an Instagram site they all follow.  Maybe something called, Parents Just Wanna Have Fun. #howtoparentanddrinkbeeratthesametime.

Or was it that some trailblazing parent just decided on their own to do this, and then as these things happen, word just spread, and before you know it, a trend was born.

So the kudos part I feel is, good for them! Hats off to them for finding a way to balance parenting with self-care.  See? It doesn’t all have to be self-sacrificing and denial of some of the pleasures they had pre-kids.

Which then leads into the envy part I feel.  What the heck.  Where was this trend when I was having kids?  No Boomer parent ever took their kid to a bar.  Well, unless you count one of Ernie’s neighbors dads.  But he did the right thing and left the kids in the car after picking them up from basketball practice, while he was in the bar having a quick one on the way home.  And oh wait, he wasn’t a Boomer.  He was a Silent Generation.  Greatest generation for sure. 

Does it have something to do with microbreweries and that somehow, calling it a microbrewery makes it not seem like a bar? But, they serve beer, and there is a bar. So, you can call it the Taj Mahal if you want, but it is still a bar.

Which then leads into the horror part.  This is a bar, people!! Why do you think it’s ok to bring your 2 year old here? What kind of message are you sending your 2 year old? Mommy and Daddy are gonna get a little buzz on, while you buzz around pretending to be Buzz Lightyear.  We call that a win-win kiddos. Do Mommy and Daddy determine who is going to be the designated driver? Because as far as I can tell, they both seem to be imbibing.

So there you have it.  A weird mix of admiration, envy and horror.  I wonder what trend might emerge next?  Mommy and me time at the medical marijuana dispensaries?