Dear Justin Letter

Dear Beloved Reader,

I need your help.

You may remember that our house was in the midst of a serious Justin Bieber outbreak. Well, we are still in the midst of a serious Bieber outbreak. In fact, it’s gotten worse. Where previously the Bieber sores were limited to Nayezca’s brain, they’ve now spread to Adayah, who walks around the house proclaiming, “I love Justin Bieber.” And, to boot, when I mock Justin Bieber with bad dancing when his music comes on (which is, you know, like four hours a day), Adayah runs up to me and punches me. I wish I were kidding.

This was back when I still loved my children.

The good-natured family tension surrounding Justin Bitchface boiled over recently when Nayezca returned from a trip to the mall with Sonya with a Justin Bieber t-shirt. Sonya did well when she briefed Nayezca that I probably wouldn’t let her out of the house with the shirt on (true, she got rejected the other day) but goofed when she coached Nayezca not to tell me she even got the shirt in the first place. (Sonya’s defense was, “I didn’t tell her to lie, I simply told her to not divulge that she got it.” I’m becoming more convinced that my wife was once a defendant in some terrible crime.) That’s ok, because for a while I coached Adayah to not tell her Mommy that we were making weekly trips to Nogales and coming back with hundreds of pounds of “spices and leaves” in our trunk and to smile and wave at the nice men with automatic rifles at the checkpoint.

Most recently, Nayezca put a picture of Justin Homewrecker on the wall in her room.

"I'm cute and easy to have a crush on now, but just wait until I blow a pound of cocaine and pass out on stage when I'm 19 because I never had a childhood."

If I had any balls (which, if you’ve been reading this internet-sharing site even infrequently, you’ve surely realized I don’t) I’d simply take it off the wall, wipe my ass with it, and call it day. But since I can’t stand up to my seven year-old daughter, I’ve taken to the passive-aggressive method of slyly putting imaginary first-person quotes next to the picture instead. Yesterday’s quote read: “I punch baby cows in their tails because I hate them,” while today’s reads, “At the zoo I like to throw rocks at the elephants because I hate them.” Is this immature? Yes. Is this self-defeating and further encouraging more Biberitis? Most likely. Is it a fun way to deal with the fact that I’m losing my daughters to a Canadian eunuch who doubles as an incurable sexually transmitted infection? Indeed.

Sonya shot me one of those death looks the other day when Adayah quipped, “Justin Bieber hits dogs.”

"I'm going to hit you."

Before I could congratulate my daughter and reward her with candy, I caught Sonya’s divorce-stare from the kitchen and quietly retreated to my bowl of cereal. Sonya quickly let me know that this whole Justin Bieber thing has gone too far and that my disdain, mockery, and passive-aggressive attempts at brainwashing are pushing the limits of fun and bordering on cruelty, insensitivity, and, gasp (!), poor modeling. And while I’m not convinced that my behavior has been over the top and inappropriate (you want inappropriate parenting behavior? I’ll show you inappropriate parenting behavior!), I do concede that perhaps Sonya’s point of view isn’t totally demented and psychotic.

The question, then, is what to do? Give in to my desire to consistently mock Justin Fuckface (and relish in my righteousness in four years when he gets busted in a heroin orgy?) or take one for the team and ease off? And if I ease off, do I ease off completely, or just partially? Stay with the sticky note quotes and refrain from verbally berating him? Pretend I’ve had an epiphany and act like I love Justin Bieber hoping the reverse psychology will drive my daughters away from him? Drink a bottle of scotch and pass out on the living room floor like I did when my brother-in-law visited? Write an asinine internet-sharing piece that has a complete paragraph in which every sentence ends with a question mark?

Listen here all you 30-something ladies: I want your advice, but before you get too high on that horse, remember that these were the guys you were swooning over a while back.

Please, help me. You might have grandkids, you might have kids, you might have dogs (equivocal to kids most of the time), or you may just have the good sense to be only responsible for yourself. Regardless of who you are, I need your advice. How do I maintain my own sanity, keep marital harmony, and avoid psychologically abusing my children all at once?

Cordially,

Desert Dad