Why The Hatch Boys Marry Late In Life

My dear Kate, bless her heart, is the most indecisive child alive. When faced with a choice of any kind, large or small, she debates and debates and debates until finally I just snap and choose for her. Clothes shopping is a nightmare, and much of the time the new clothes go unworn for months before she warms up to them. Bruce and I make her exactly what she wants for breakfast and later she laments that maybe she should have had the scrambled eggs instead, and I think to myself, "Does it not occur to you that you eat breakfast 365 days a year and you can have eggs tomorrow? This is not something to be shedding tears over!" If I offer a treat at the supermarket checkout, Kiki is all over it like white on rice. She'll have something on the belt in a half-second and will happily eat whatever it was she chose so haphazardly- sometimes she enjoys a Slim Jim, sometimes she equally enjoys Reese's Pieces. Her elder sister, however, will carefully mentally itemize the various qualities of Skittles and M&M's, attempt to guage her mood in order to select the better fit, and then, in a last ditch effort, will beg for both since she just can't make up her mind.

This is a Hatch trait. We Barratt's will decide anything at the drop of a hat. Not always for the best, mind you, as my romantic history will attest. But, a decision is made and then it is done. No internal wars need to be waged around here, and things usually turn out okay even if it is a little convoluted getting there. It goes without saying then, that poor little Kate's struggles have met a generally unsympathetic audience where her mother is concerned.

It all came to a head yesterday at Chuck E. Cheese. Kate has been begging to go, and I told her that she would have to earn the trip. She cleaned her playroom, and then she wiped down and cleaned the outside of all the kitchen cabinets. They were not small jobs, and she did a good job (seriously, I was quite surprised). I was happy to take her, Kiki, and her friend Whitney to Chuck E. Cheese. Did those girls ever have a good time! They loved the games, they loved the pizza, they loved the stupid robotic band, they loved it all. We should have gone home right then with everyone so happy, but NOOOOOOOOOO...I had to spill the beans about how all the tickets they had been collecting could be used to buy a trinket. You know darn well how that goes down at Chuck E. Cheese: You need about 700 tickets to buy anything better than a jelly bracelet, and Kiki had 20 tickets, Kate had 40, and Whitney had 60. Kiki immediately chose a sucker and a plastic ladybug. Done. Kate chose Pop Rocks. Kate chose a different flavor of Pop Rocks. An exchange was made. Whitney chose a plastic lizard. Kate exchanges the Pop Rocks for a plastic lizard. Whitney chose sticker earrings. Kate exchanges the lizard for a different color lizard. Kate wants the lizard AND earrings also and my mathematical explanation is not accepted. Emotions rise. I attempt to leave. Kate begins to cry. She wants to go back to the Pop Rocks. At this point, we had been standing at that counter trying to spend a MINISCULE number of tickets for close to 15 minutes and I was done. So we left. She had a tantrum in the car about these stupid Pop Rocks that was so unbelievable that I had to record it.



This is totally what you Hatch Boys do when you are dating! You see Pop Rocks and you really want them, but then you notice a plastic lizard under the glass and it sure looks really nice, but once you have it in your hand you think to yourself, "Man, this lizard is not as good looking when I see it close up..." and then you start to second guess yourself about the Pop Rocks again, or maybe should you try something different, and before you know it you've been standing at the counter WAY TOO LONG.

That is all.

(And I love you tons, Burke and Mark, and you deserve a girl who is worth a millionzillion tickets. Just FIND HER already so I don't need Botox for your wedding pictures.)