Dr. Strangehands, or how i learned to stop worrying and love birthday parties for 3-year-olds

it's birthday party season. we met most of our parent-friends because they all had babies at roughly the same time we did, which means we've been spending every weekend for the past 2 months going to birthday parties. parties in the park, parties at Kidville, parties at the Music Together place, parties at people's too-small living quarters, parties in trailer park meth labs. you know, routine stuff. often, two parties in one weekend. sometimes two in one day. lord, can we please just have one weekend to ourselves again?

on saturday we were at our first of two parties -- for twins, so that's kind of like two parties at once now that i think of it. it was at 10:30, which meant no beer. fine. whatever. i recently invested in a hip flask so i was cool with that. it was a lovely day and Prospect Park was uncharacteristically empty. there was much frolicking. i brought a Frisbee. there were bagels. a dude played guitar and led the kids through a rousing rendition of yellow submarine. there were, of course, cupcakes (question for another time: when did cupcakes replace birthday cakes? i have yet to have a slice of birthday cake this year. i blame sex and the city and those ridiculously overhyped pucks they serve at Magnolia Bakery.)

anyway. we're all enjoying ourselves. my wife is wearing our newborn daughter in a sling, i turn and see her from behind, talking with another woman who recently had her second kid. i saunter over, pausing to grab a bagel on the way. i take a bite of the bagel. it's a good bagel. tasty smoked salmon, the works. approaching my wife, i take another bite of the bagel. i mean, damn, this is a good bagel. i lean in and tap-smack my bride on her rear.

but i notice that there is a different amount of give. the physics of her jiggle have somehow altered. the plane of her haunch seems to unfurl at a perceptibly different angle of convexity.

uh-oh.

i fear i may have just ass-grabbed another man's wife.

in front of my own wife!

we made eye contact and i confirmed, to my horror, that which i had suspected: this was not my wife's ass. and now this woman is looking at me thinking, "that was not my husband's grope."

hasty apologies were profusely delivered. she laughed. my bride laughed as well. i apologized again. i turned shades of red hitherto known only to beets and onions and firetrucks. all was forgiven in high spirits. i have a newborn, after all, i'm not sleeping well. i plead baby. people understood.

the party returned to normal.

i totally got away with it! when the laughter subsided i even said "ok, then. who's next?" ... because i am a creepy, creepy old man trapped inside the body of a creepy younger man. anyway, the whole affair provided a brief moment of levity. so it dawned on me: this is probably how swinging got started in the '70s!

i sure hope that wasn't the last kid's birthday party of the season.