The first time my daughter started shrieking "happy meal," from the backseat, I didn't know what she was saying. Then I saw the giant billboard. It was Ronald hair red, with a giant golden M in the middle. That's it. "Mommy, it says happy meal!" my daughter yelled again.
Yup, marketing to kids works. So does making your business family friendly. Which is why I recognized our family in Jennifer Blaise Kramer's Bad Parent: Supersize Me. We've stopped fighting the fast food fight, and we're not apologizing.
As a working mom, I have been known to pull into the McDonald's drive through at lunchtime. With more interviews schedule for the afternoon, I can put off my craving for food, but making my daughter starve? That's what I call bad parenting. Unfortunately, I'm not the mom who has a lunchbox full of homemade health food handy when it's time to go in the morning. I'm lucky I remember to take my daughter WITH me some mornings. I keep boxes of raisins and bags of multi-grain snacks in the car to make up for my shortcomings. But when the lunch bell rings, my daughter's tummy starts a rumblin'.
I have a choice. I could stop at a "real restaurant." I could spend an hour or more sitting there while the waitresses glare at the two of us taking up a table with our meager meal, while my daughter decides she'll eat ketchup and only ketchup and I cajole her to try a little bit of chicken salad. They know my tip isn't going to be big because we didn't eat big. I could sit for 30 minutes before they take my order, another 20 before our food arrives while my daughter gets fiestier minute by hungry minute. The crayons in my purse can only keep her quiet so long, and explaining "busy kitchen" to a 3-year-old is as easy as it sounds. What about those raisins? We could, I suppose, but that would mean a full tummy - and I just order a $10 entree that I'd hope she'd eat.
Mickey D's is looking better every second. With its apple slices that one commentor on Kramer's piece protests have been peeled of all their nutritious value. Hmm. Crappy apples or making her wait an extra two hours for lunch. Not a tough decision.
Ironically, I don't eat at McDonald's myself. Not because I'm turning up my nose at the grease, but because I'm a vegetarian. But this vegetarian has found herself turning more and more toward fast food chains since I became a parent. With a dire need for caffeine and a child who likes sleeping in the backseat, I face the choice of leaving her in car care, schlepping a cranky toddler in and out of the carseat or a smooth ride through the drive through. Ronald, the King, Wendy, Dunkin' know just how I like it.
I'm comfortable with the choice because my daughter still shrieks with delight at a McDonald's sign. It's still a treat. It's still new. She still gets excited. And why shouldn't she? They have a playground and boxes of juice Mommy doesn't get to water down. They have colorful boxes for her food with pictures to pop out and mazes to draw in. And you can't forget the toys.
The places we frequent as a family, the Greek restaurant with the to-die-for spinach pie and the creamy hummus, the Chinese place with the veggie lo mein and the pork fried rice, they're the spots where Mommy and Daddy willingly fork over the small amount set aside for a young family dining out in this economy. They're her "nothing special places," like the "nothing special" yogurt she can get any morning or the "nothing special" boxes of raisins in the backseat.
It's when McDonald's fails to excite her that I'll worry about my parenting.
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