Going Postal

Bridget and I stood over Annabelle with hopeless, distant looks in our eyes. I let out a deep sigh. She shrugged. And we both did everything in our power to avoid the awkward gazes of the sympathetic people who tiptoed around us.

There, on the stone steps of the post office in the middle of town, Annabelle was throwing her first public tantrum.

She's thrown mini tantrums before. I mean, she'll be 2-years-old at the end of the summer. There was the time in the car when she lost her mimi (pacifier), the time when she was too tired to be at Assembly Row, and the time she did NOT want to come inside to eat dinner. But this one, oh boy. This one.

It's still hard for me to believe that the perfect, adorable, cherubic angel in the picture above is capable of anything other than sunshine and rainbows. She's too sweet, right? Other kids throw tantrums, but my daughter throws kisses and flowers.

Right.

We went to the post office because we needed to get little Annabelle a passport. We're off to Aruba for a much-needed vacation in the near future and she'll be leaving the country for the first time. (By the way, I got my passport when I was 30. Crazy, right? Or maybe embarrassing.) Getting a passport means getting a public photo, which Annabelle hasn't done before.

Simply put, it didn't go well.

At first, the two female employees brought out a stool on which Annabelle was supposed to sit. No luck. Annabelle reached for Bridget while I filled out the annoying paperwork. Then the tears started. Then the yelling. And the uncontrollable, "No, no, no." 

"Maybe you could just hold her," said the first woman, who we'll call Beth, as I came over to help.

We tried that and it looked like we'd found a solution. Hooray! Not too bad!

"Oh, this is the new camera. I'm not sure how it works and I can't click the button," said a suddenly unhelpful Beth. "I'll need to get Alice." 

As Alice (or whatever her name was) came over, Annabelle's tantrum started to gain momentum. Bridget tried to soothe her. I tried to just get it over with. Annabelle tried to run away.

"See if you can hold her, Dad, and keep your head out of the picture," said an increasingly annoyed Alice.


Finally, mercifully, Annabelle stopped crying for 10 seconds and I extended my daughter while arching my head as far back as it would go.

"I can still see your arm," offered Alice, "but maybe this will work." (One of the outtakes is right over there.)

After a couple signatures, some stamps, we were done. But that's when Annabelle's real meltdown started. It's impossible to know why, exactly,, but my guess is that it was a combination of being tired, being forced to do something against her will, and being 20 months old. The crying, wailing, sobbing, and screaming reached a crescendo as Annabelle wriggled out of Bridget's arms to lay down on the cool, concrete steps of the post office.

Finally, after a couple minutes of awkward glances and the public embarrassment came and went, we scooped up Annabelle and put her in her car seat. She was asleep 30 seconds later.

Ah, well. At least she got the tantrum out of her system for this year. That's how it works, right?