From the Archives-PIMP RAT

(This is from a really old entry. I'm not sure of the exact date but it was written when Olivia was 12, so at least three years ago!)

So I ‘m at the pizza parlor with O and some of her friends. The PTQ’s, (Pre-teen Queens) as we call them. I’m sitting at a table all by myself, because O prefers I not associate with her in public. I think her friends are actually okay with me, but my own daughter won’t be seen with me. Not that I’m bitter.

Anyway. The girls are at that confusing age, where they are definitely not little girls anymore but they don’t really have figures either, so the boys don’t pay much attention to them no matter how ridiculously low-slung their pants are. Sometimes they act like teenagers, primping for hours with their makeup and clothes, giggling about the boys who pay no attention to them. Other times they are silly and annoying and they interact with the world in this fascinating way—like everything they say and do is the FUNNIEST, most HYSTERICAL thing EVER. Loudly. (Everything they do is loud, except when adults are around and they need to talk about things that matter. Then they whisper.)

Unfortunately for my daughter, she had to eventually acknowledge my existence, if only to ask for more money for the video games. I coughed up some quarters and the PTQ’s went to the vending machines, the ones that dispense 12 M & M’s for a quarter and strange candies shaped like little teeny tiny bananas, called “runts.” These are the same machines that spit out plastic containers with incredibly cheap and gaudy jewelry, and fake spiders. At least, that’s what USED to be in these plastic containers. However, the “prize” my daughter received for her quarter was…..a “pimped-out” rat. Yes, that’s right. A miniature plastic rat, “pimped-out”, so to speak, with a gray trench coat jauntily thrown over his shoulders, a chain–link necklace, fedora and sunglasses. Oh, and he has a walking stick. Ethnically, he appears to be of the gray persuasion and not of any clearly identifiable race, although it’s hard to really know when you are dealing with stereotypes that are only ¾” tall.

Now I ask you, what the hell kind of “prize” is this to be giving our children? They put a quarter into a machine, expecting a super ball or possibly one of those disgusting rubber octopuses (octopi?) that you are supposed to throw at the wall and then watch while it “walks” its way down. . Instead, they get a rat. A rat, dressed like a pimp! My daughter is 12 and she immediately recognized it for what it was. But a younger child would (hopefully, anyway) be somewhat befuddled and how would you explain it? “Well, honey, it’s a well-dressed rodent who makes a lot of money by forcing young girls to have sex with low-life drug users.”

I don’t think so.

Still, it occurred to me that the world has changed a whole lot since I was a kid. I mean, I know—no sh**, Sherlock, right? Just look around and see what has become of our world in 25 scant years. I think the “pimped out” rat-dispensing machine is one of those little signs of the true decline of our culture. You might not notice it as readily as you would a garbage-strewn beach, or a Christina Aguilera video but it’s just as telling. What’s next? Toy crack pipes? Tiny necklaces for dolls that say “ho” on them?

Well, so I immediately confiscated the “pimped-out” rat and put him where he belongs—on the dashboard of my car. Every once in awhile, as I’m cruising down the road, I look at the smirky little rat and imagine he’s saying “c’mon baby, just for a little while…until you get on your feet again.”