As I have mentioned many times before, one of my least favorite things about being a dad is having to interact with other parents, especially moms. For a variety of reasons I try to avoid them at all costs, and often succeed, but lately I have not been having a good run. The weather is nicer, the parks are busier and the alone moms are looking for someone to talk to. That means even a mean-looking quiet guy like me is fair game. As if the increase in shop talk with moms didn't get my anxiety roaring enough, I have now developed a fear of interacting with small children. Absurd? That is for you to decide. I'll explain.
Monday afternoon Monica left work early and met us at the park. As the events of the day progressed we ended up in Salem Common where we blew off steam with the sports buggy and a bunch of other kid-friendly activities. At some point during the visit Monica took Av over to the swings, which at the Common are usually dominated by renegade teenagers. I watched from a nearby bench like an old man as she not only pushed the baby, but also helped push some older kids from a Boys and Girls Club after school group. Kids continued to flock over to her for support and entertainment and things even got a little heated at one point when some slutty looking teenage girls tried to bully one little kid off the swing.
On a side note, the kid being bullied off the swing, Ryan, was a pimp. I saw him kiss two girls while he was over there and heard him make plans to kiss a third the next day. He couldn't have been older than 8. The best part was, in true Tiger Woods fashion, before kissing the second girl he said "You can't tell Alexis about this or I'm not going to kiss you again." Awesome.
Now, Monica is a teacher so dealing with kids is obviously not a foreign concept to her, but witnessing her patience and apparent enjoyment in interacting with this ethnic hodgepodge of at-risk youth made me realize that the situation she was in was pretty much my worst nightmare. Dealing with bitchy, snobby, judgmental moms is one thing, but dealing with kids is a whole different kettle of fish. Kids are mean, dirty, unpredictable and often times unable to properly communicate what they want. In addition, most of the kids I come across are also accompanied by said bitchy moms, which makes me even more nervous that I am going to do something to piss them off, forcing some sort of rant about how poor of a parent I am.
Dealing with other kids is something that I hope to avoid, always. I dread giving 13-year-old Av rides to the mall with her awkward teenage friends. I dread 8-year-old Av having friends from school over that I am not only forced to supervise, but interact with also. I remember my dad having to buddy up to my sister's friends. I am all set with all of that. After witnessing her display at the Common I told Monica essentially what I just told you and, as if on cue, was forced into one of these nightmarish situations just a few days later.
As has been the case every day this week, the baby and I made a mid-morning visit to the park, me hoping not to have a repeat of yesterday when she insisted on going in the ocean. (To say I wasn't prepared for that would be an understatement). Avoiding that section of the park entirely, we walked over to the playground area and saw that there was only one kid, a mom and two dogs. Jackpot on several levels. Things were going fine for a while, when a few other families showed up and the equipment started to fill up. It was at this point that a boy, later to be identified as 3-year-old Harrison (or possibly Garrison, I couldn't really tell) decided that he was going to take full advantage of my height.
Harrison's mom was a classic "I adopted a kid/ got artificially inseminated" butch lesbian. More occupied with her dogs than she was with her son, she was often referred to as "Amy" instead of mom (I only know she was his mom because he called her that once, too). She would pay attention to him long enough to scold him for something, but for the most part she just watched him run around while she gave the dogs treats.
After following us over to the monkey bars, where Av had aimlessly wandered, the kid got up the courage to ask me to lift him up. What am I supposed to say? No? I think not. So nervously, hoping that he didn't 1. fall, 2. scream or 3. catch a scolding from Amy for being dangerous, I lifted him up on to the bars. The event went off without a hitch, but I wasn't lucky enough to ditch the kid there. For the remainder of his time at the park (Amy mercifully told him they had to go home about 15 minutes later) he followed me around asking me to lift him up on to things. I reluctantly obliged, figuring it was probably pretty frustrating to have two moms when you needed something up high.
The kid was nice, kind of dumb and a little aggressive, but I was glad to help in the end. This does not change the fact that I was anxious and awkward through the entire exchange, and I was not so glad to help that I would ever want to do something like that again. It is safe to say that Harrison has not changed me, just made me more wary of loaner kids with lesbian moms.
That's all I have today, kids. Nap time is almost over, which means I had better grab some Cheetos if I plan on eating before 7:30 tonight.
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