Johnson - Keeping up with the johnsons: Bows Guide to Black-ish Parenting

Copyright 2018 ABC Studios. All rights reserved.

Published by Kingswell, an imprint of Disney Book Group. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher.

For information address Kingswell,

1200 Grand Central Avenue, Glendale, California 91201.

Editorial Director: Wendy Lefkon

Executive Editor: Laura Hopper

Cover designed by Julie Rose

ISBN 978-1-368-02513-3

Visit www.disneybooks.com

Youve got to be freaking kidding me, I thought. Actually, Im pretty sure I said it out loud, sitting in a department store fitting room while baby Junior alternately suckled at my breast and screamed his face off, and three-year-old Zoey ran in circles inexplicably singing wiener, wiener, wiener. Held captive in the only breastfeeding-friendly corner for miles with my children acting like world-class meth addicts, I suddenly realized that I had to take an epic, imminent, and unavoidable dump.

You know the kind. The post-coffee, post-hangover, stop-your-car-and-run-sweating-into-the-closest-McDonalds kind of dump.

Crap, I mumbled unironically as my verbal disbelief continued. Zoey suddenly reversed direction in her circle running and changed her chant from wiener to crap, crap, crap. I tried to hush her while wrapping my mind around this potentially disastrous problem.

At home, I would just lock the three of us in the bathroom. Junior could cry like a pageant winner and Zoey could recite the entirety of Snoop Doggs Aint No Fun for all I cared, because we would be home, wearing mismatched pajamas, and pooping in private, where we should be! I didnt even want to be in this damn store in the first place, but Becca from med school had insisted that I be in her wedding and dictated that I buy my heinous dress from this uppity store whose employees made the clerks in Pretty Woman look like benevolent strippers.

So what the hell would I do? Walk through the enormous store with a baby on my boob and a toddler in my grip? No time. Leave the kids alone and sprint to the bathroom? No way. Poop my pants? No thanks. What then?

Call Dre.

I explained the situation to my husband as quickly as humanly possible, and what did I get? Laughter. Pure, unbridled, snorting-through-his-tears laughter.

Dre, this isnt funny. I have like five seconds to come up with a solution. Help me!

He finally got ahold of himself. Thats crappy? he offered, then broke into another peal of laughter. Number two is the charm? More laughter. Doo-doo the right thing?

I hung up on him.

I took a deep breath and scanned the room.

This could be a learning experience, right? A teachable moment that would serve Zoey well as she grew into a proficient problem solver. I can see the silver lining in every situation, right? Then I heard laughter coming from the fitting room next door. Annoying white teenage-girl laughter. She exclaimed to her friend, Oh my gawd, that dress makes your butt look like J.Los.

Never mind. There would be no teaching. There would be no explaining my decisions out loud. There would be only action, and fast. And silent prayers that there wasnt an illegal security camera pointed at me.

Zoey, hand me the diaper bag, I said.

Whats a J.Lo? she asked.

Ill tell you when youre older. Bag, please.

With the one-handed dexterity possessed only by desperate mothers, I grabbed a diaper from the bag (still holding Junior to my breast with my other arm), pulled down my pants (thank God for elastic waistbands), placed the tiny diaper faceup on the fitting room stool, and started pooping.

It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.

I was honestly pretty proud of myself for coming up with a solution in a pinch. But also, lets be honestI was pooping in a diaper in a department store. Not my best look.

The look that was priceless, however, was on Zoeys face. Im not sure if she was impressed or confused, and Im certainly not going to ask her about it ever again. Not even when shes thirty.

Despite my otherwise superwoman-like abilities, theres really no way to roll up a poop-filled diaper with one hand. Thus, I traded out my boob for a pacifier and placed Junior into his stroller while I deftly rolled the offending evidence and hid it in the depths of the diaper bag like a dead body.

It smells like crap in here, proclaimed the prima donna in the fitting room next door.

My blood ran cold.

Zoey, however, looked like she was about to blurt out the winning answer on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire. With the reflexes of a jackrabbit, I covered Zoeys mouth with my hand and whispered intently, Zoey, if you can keep your mouth shut until we get outside, I will buy you anything in this store that you want. Anything. Do you understand? She nodded.

I grabbed her by the hand and zoomed the stroller toward the toy department as fast as her three-year-old legs could walk.

Fifteen minutes and $200 later, we reached the checkout. The perfectly coiffed Stepford wife at the register smiled like she had a gun to her back. I could see her judging my unruly hair, flip-flops, and faint scent of poop. I eyed the door, scanning for the closest trash can. Cutting the tension, she feigned interest in Zoey. What a pretty doll you chose. Is it your birthday, sweetheart?

Zoey gleefully blurted, No, Mommy said she would buy it for me if I didnt tell anyone that she pooped in a diaper in the changing room.

The only thing scarier than seeing your own face after a hard night of drinking is the thought of your teenagers getting drunk. (Or worse, drinking and driving!) And even though Zoey and Junior are good kids, I still worry. When Zoey was sixteen and Junior was fourteen, Seth from next door got caught drinking, and it sent me into a panic. Apparently our neighbor Janine had come home from her Tuesday night poker game to find Seth and his best friend drunk in an empty bathtub, drinking Chablis out of their shoes and burning cigarette holes into the shower curtain.