In the old days...

...I would have been holding someone's hair out of the way as she puked into a toilet only a third of the way into the party.

Now, I'm wiping a 4-year-old's butt only a third of the way into the party after she did something very scary in the hostess' sole bathroom.

In the old days, I would have been climbing a fence and leaping into the swimming pool at an apartment complex at, say, 2 a.m. (Said apartment complex would not have been home to any of my friends, just one that happened to boast a pool.)

Now, at the same party that has an unusable, smelly bathroom, I'm watching the bottoms of my son's feet vanish through the doggie door as he climbs, in and out, in and out, never pausing until he comes face-to-face with the beagle who has a legitimate need for the doggie door.

In the old days, I would have awakened at 7:30 a.m. and called Girlfriend A in the midst of hangover paranoia to ask whether I really did what Girlfriend B, who called in the midst of her own hangover paranoia, says I did.

Now, I'm thinking I should apologize to a girlfriend for the fact that one of her beagles ate sidewalk chalk during her party because my children left the chalk laying on the patio -- or, sigh ... did they deliberately FEED it to the dog?