My Week in Parenting: Getting a Propane Tank with my Two Year Old

On doing the hard stuff, because you no longer have a choice

This week I went to Home Depot and bought a propane tank with my 2-year-old daughter. I know this probably sounds mundane. I know that maybe you, the person reading this, have even gone to Home Depot and bought a propane tank yourself and thought nothing of it. Perhaps you even brought your kid with you! Maybe you even brought multiple kids. But for me, this is a very specific type of task that gives me major anxiety.

First of all, doing anything that involves new logistics that I don’t quite understand gives me anxiety. I did not take my car to a car wash for many, many years because I was afraid. How would I know if it was the kind of car wash where you got out of the car or stayed in the car? Would I know when to get out of the car? What if I stayed in the car but then they were like “no you get OUT of the car, you thought you were going to ride through this car wash like a carnival ride? Get a load of this lady! She thought the car wash was a carnival ride!”

Anyway, you see what I mean. I didn’t know how to get propane from Home Depot. I knew they sold it, but figured (and was correct) that it was one of those items that you can’t just walk into the store and load up on your cart, on account of the possibility of it blowing up the entire Garden Wing. But I needed a propane tank! We were having friends over to grill on our new grill and it didn’t come with a propane tank. I also needed it now, because the party was that night, and didn’t have the option to go without my 2-year-old with me, because, well, most afternoons I have my 2-year-old with me on account of her not knowing how to drive or prepare her own snacks.

I want to clarify I’m not necessarily anxious about doing hard things, I do plenty of hard things. I’ll happily go to a new type of difficult workout class or paint my own built in bookcase or try a new recipe. What I’m talking about is logistical things. Things that involve a few different, albeit easy, steps, in a place I’m not familiar with, especially if one or more of my kids are with me. Because what if I can’t figure out the thing AND my kids are screaming? What if I blow up the Home Depot Garden section AND my 2-year-old needs a diaper change?

But here’s one thing I love about having kids, that I did not expect to love: you often lose the option to wuss out when things are hard. I guess I could have canceled the barbecue if I was really too scared to take my daughter into Home Depot and figure out where the heck propane was, but I wanted to have the grilling party! So I had to do it. I didn’t really have a choice.

I’ve seen a lot of posts online lately from people without kids asking how anyone manages to work full time, keep their house clean, work out, have a social life, and hobbies and I have to admit, those posts make me laugh sometimes. Because I think I probably felt that way a little before I had kids, too. It seemed like there was no time to do anything! But then I had kids and it REALLY seemed like there was no time to do anything. I suddenly looked back on my life before kids and was like, what was I thinking? I had all the time in the world! Entire weekends and evenings with literally nothing to do and nobody to take care of except myself? Why wasn’t I cleaning my whole house, writing novels, competitively breakdancing, or learning to count cards and making million of dollars gambling? I can’t even imagine it now. Because now, with even less time and a large majority of that time taken up being the voice of an Elsa figurine while also cooking buttered noodles, answering work emails, and signing up for summer camp on my phone all at the same time, I actually am managing to work my job, have a social life, have hobbies (ok maybe not like a LOT of hobbies, but I am writing this Substack which is not mandatory and I read a book last month), workout regularly, cook meals (many of which are buttered noodles but whatever), and do dishes.

The difference is, once you have kids, you learn to stop wussing out. Before I had kids, I may have wussed out and not gotten the propane tank. I maybe would have put off the barbecue and waited for the weekend when my husband could go do it. Because I had that option! My friends from before kids would probably still have been free Saturday, but when you have kids and your friends who also have kids say they can come over on a specific night, you better do it that night because if you try to put it off, someone’s kid will get sick. Someone will forget they actually have gymnastics that night and can’t come. If you want to have a life when you have kids, you have to do the stuff and you have to do it now. Even stuff that scares you. You just have to! It’s not noble or even all that commendable, it’s just how life needs to function, or everything will explode like a propane tank in Home Depot.

To be quite honest, the process of getting the tank was a little dicey. My daughter fell asleep in the car on the way there and I had to wake her up, and she was crying. I couldn’t find an employee, so I was just wandering around the grill section holding a crying 2-year-old looking for anyone, anyone in an orange vest. When I finally found someone to help, they told me I just had to buy a metaphorical propane tank, bring my receipt, and wait outside for someone to help me get an actual propane tank. But when I got outside, nobody was there, so I loaded my daughter back into her carseat (luckily I had bought actual, not metaphorical, M&Ms at checkout to bribe her through this process) and drove back to the propane area, gripping my receipt, hoping someone would magically show up. They did not. I considered just driving away, leaving the propane, cancelling the barbecue, and offering my $65 to Home Depot as a donation, but then I remembered that I am a parent! I have no choice but to do hard things! So I turned on a Frozen story podcast and left my daughter briefly in the car (Sorry CPS!) to run inside and find someone to help me. When I did find someone, the person had also never used the propane machine (yes, it turns out it comes in a giant vending machine just like if you were buying Skittles) so we struggled through it together. But then! The propane was dispensed from the giant vending machine like manna from heaven, and the confused employee loaded it into my car just as Elsa yelled “ENOUGH” and froze Arendelle into an eternal winter. And then together, me, my daughter, Elsa, and the actual propane tank drove home together, our mission accomplished.

So many things about being parent are difficult. The sleepless nights, the constant care of children who demand snacks, hugs, games, attention, very specific birthday party decorations, etc. But along the way, there are so many gifts that keep you going. The first time you make your baby laugh. Taking your kid to the ocean for the first time. A fridge that’s always stocked with string cheese. And no longer being allowed to wuss out on the hard stuff.

.