Only in America could someone right a book about setting up play dates for their kids and then tipping a few back while the little monsters tear the house down.  According to this article in Reveries that’s just what Christie Mellor has done with her book The Three-Martini Playdate.  Here’s a small taste:

Christie’s book actually is one of a number of titles “over the last
few years that urge parents to ease up” by mixing a little alcohol with
their childrearing. Some say this is a healthy thing, “a small break”
from all the “runs to soccer and ballet classes, fundraisers and
homework projects … the almost sadistically stressful world of modern
parenting.”

and

But Christie Mellor says the alcoholism issue misses the point, that
she really only meant the momtinis as "a metaphor for having more fun
in your life … It’s not just about drinking and cutting loose," she
says. "It’s about giving your children the tools to be self sufficient
… Because if you haven’t changed your general attitude, then you just
end up being a really busy drunk."

Somehow I just can’t picture my grandmothers or mother indulging in this kind of silliness.  I mean my grandmothers were non-drinkers and my mom didn’t start drinking alcohol until she was well into her 30s, but even if they did drink and did decide to have a martini during play date they sure wouldn’t make a big deal about it.  Has this generation been so Oprah-fied that we have to create drinking metaphors to tell us how to give our "children the tools to be self sufficient"?

When I was a kid being self sufficient meant you were banned from the house until it was time to eat either lunch or dinner and then if you didn’t show up on time you were in big trouble.  That’s when we kids took the opportunity to discover the wonders of fighting, which I guess in today’s parlance would be called "dispute resolution", seeing who had the most guts by taking whatever outlandish dare we came up with at that moment, finding out how far we could get from our homes without getting into trouble, finding and hiding the neighbors stash of Playboys that he foolishly put in his curbside trashcan, etc.  Our parents didn’t need metaphors to teach us self sufficiency and I suspect today’s mothers don’t either; they’re just looking for a reason to get lit while managing their kids’ schedules.  Of course micro-managing their kids’ lives is a great tool for teaching self sufficiency.