Introspective mommy moment..plus playground etiquette
I have to stop watching my son from afar.
[Quick little set up]
When my alarm clock went off at 6am, I decided we only need 20 minutes to get ready for school in the morning and since we have to leave my apartment by 7:30 to make it to the bus stop in time for Aidan to board, we can sleep until 7am. (Aidan almost ALWAYS crawls into my bed around 3am, coincidentally immediately after Eric leaves for work)
For some reason, I can't seem to 'get' my alarm clock buttons right. So instead of changing the alarm to 7am, I accidentally changed the TIME to 7am so when my body clock woke up at 7:52 I jumped out of bed realizing Aidan missed the bus.
Not that big of a problem because I own a car, and Aidan's school is about 15 minutes away and the doors open at 8:37am. Meaning, we didn't have to leave our apartment until about 8:20 for us to be at school on time. So, I'll be about 1/2 hour late for work, but I work alone in my own isolated office (a story for another day...) it's not a big deal.
The reason for this little backstory? I drove him to school early enough for him to play with the other children in the schoolyard before the doors opened. (he loves that)
[/Quick little set up]
(((how is THAT for a tangent...?)
[breathe]
ANYWAYS...
There were a bunch of 'big kids' who were obviously friends, playing some game of tag together on the monkey bars.. One of them was pretty fresh with the others & casually (but with a serious undertone) teasing everyone. Aidan just bounced around playing by himself, but I can tell he was watching the other kids, kinda wanting to playing with them. If someone teased another, calling them a 'poopy head' or whatever the cool thing to call someone in order to put them down is these days. (In my day, it was 'nice head' or 'jerkoff') Aidan would laugh along with them... and you can sense that he wanted to be involved but no one was noticing him.
[sn0rt] I always laugh when I think of the term...'nice head' WHAT DID THAT MEAN??? Neil McNeill ALWAYS said that to other people (the nasty little ****) and YES, I had a nasty neighbor named Neil McNeill. Scary thing is-- he was a JUNIOR. Cruelty X 2.
I know this is NOT an issue, but it breaks my heart or at least makes it beat a little harder for the little guy. He's always talking about 'the big kids' in the park and finding ways to impress them. It makes me just realize that one day he might get teased or feel left out.
Generally, EVERYONE likes Aidan. He gets along with other children extremely well and doesn't seem to have a shyness problem. He has no inhibitions with going up to a group of kids he doesn't know too well and involving himself.. (Jesus, where'd he get THAT from...)
[another tangent]-- my boyfriend has an issue sometimes because when we go out, I talk to a lot of people.. That's how WE met, ya know? i.e: I'm not shy.
[/another tangent]
I don't know why I'm so worried. Aidan has a lot of self confidence (of course i'm still pondering at what EXACT age we lose our innocence of just being ourselves...) I think this is part of the reason if not THE MAIN reason I enrolled him in Karate classes. If you KNOW you can kick someones ***, you have a lot more confidence in yourself... Simply put, but am I wrong?
And I KNOW I have bitched about this before.
[yes, another tangent in the form of a story]
Let's get real, Most of life's lessons are first taught on the playground. Aidan was once the *new kid in the playground* and he's still at the age where no one really intimidates him. It doesn't surprise me that he blindly runs over to a group of older boys who were playing in the pile of dirt kids in the city use as a sandbox. Edging his way into the action one of them (an evil looking little piece of ****) stops the group & hollars:
'You can't play with us.. You're new. And you're probably in Pre-K'
If I remember correctly, this is the same little piece of **** that upon his arrival to the grounds one afternoon, notices Aidan playing with a bunch of other kids, stops his bike.. says to his friend:
'Who's that chump?' I assumed he was the mayor of the playground and I can only imagine this kid in High School.
I swore to myself, that when Aidan reached school age, and may be subjected to *teasing* that it will take every ounce of my energy to stop me from getting all Hand that Rocks the Cradle on anyone who dares to bother my sweet innocent angel of a child. You know the scene where Rebecca Demorney goes to the play ground and tells the bully to stop ******* with the little girl she's watching. That would be me.
Unscathed and unaffected, Aidan still tried to nuzzle his way in on the sand action as I just stood there, grabbed my heart, and watched. 'They'll work it out... they'll work it out...' I repeated to myself over & over as again, the little ****, this time with an entire chorus chanted:
'You're a baby... you're in Pre-K..'
And aidan's face turned into the angry stay-puff marshmallow man & replied:
'I'm not a baby!!'
This time, as the little trooper tried to penetrate the dirt sand circle, the boys physically blocked him out, even pushing him at times. By now, the moms of the older boys came running over to scold them for teasing. Of course, the little **** was left with a baby sitter who was on the other side of the playground chasing his toddler sister around. (She'll probably be the neighborhood whore one day.)
Always thinking on my toes, I grabbed the Spider-Man plane my brother Ben gave him for his birthday that we could not quite figure out yet, pumped it up & threw it as hard as I could. The darn thing took off & flew above the parking lot, 2 garages and made a quick turn towards one of the buildings. It quickly diffused the situation as all the boys went
'WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAH' and ran towards it. All I could think of was: 'wow. the damn thing actually works.'
Of course, after Aidan & I returned to the park having retrieved the plane, they all surrounded him. Patting him on the shoulders, they were falling over themselves asking if they could have a turn next. Aidan, god bless his little heart was all excited & jumped around saying 'Ok, ok guys....' He was just so happy they were even talking to him... Hell, he's a better person than me, I would have told them to go **** themselves.. Especially the little ring-leader.
Then it hit me. My baby... my beautiful innocent little baby is entering a world of mean-spirited children and will most probably get teased for something or another. Just watching his innocence that day brought tears to my eyes, because he DOESN'T know how to be mean. He doesn't know when someone is even making fun of him he is that innocent. I don't know how long that innocence lasts... When do our children lose that sense of security? Watching how quickly the other boys turned against him within the time the little ******* who held the conch snapped his dirty little hands, scared me. Although I stayed out of it, I am not always going to be around to protect him. For goodness sakes, he is entering Kindergarten in a New York City public school this coming September. He might as well put away his Thomas the Tank ENgine toys & start playing with guns. He'll probably loose his virginity by 8, I mean let's face it: This is a generation that's lost an even bigger piece of innocence. This is a generation that lives with the everyday threat of violence in their schools. I'm going to elaboate on that thought later, but all I know is, we survived last Saturday.
Eventually the kids were all running about playing with each other, being civil. I heard through the network of moms at the playground that the little **** is a troublemaker. Luckily, I'm not the only one who thinks so.
(Ooooooh I will drop that kid on his *** so hard if he pulls any more **** with my baby)
As we were leaving Aidan was yelling at the top of his lungs
'Goodbye Nicholas... Goodbye Thomas... goodbye Donovan...'
No one was listening. God he's so sweet sometimes it makes me want to cry.
Later in the evening, I asked Aidan how he felt when the boys wouldn't let him play with him.. He didn't even bat an eye and said
'Oh they were just mean to me because they thought I was new, but I told them I'm not new anymore.'
You're certainly right kiddo. You just survived the playground.
Jesus, who could even THINK of being cruel to this face:
[heart melts]
Is it ever going to end? Aidan said the other day that girls are lucky because they don't have to worry about being beat up. Yes, I told him.. but girls are MEAN to each other. Of course I went off on a tangent about how girls are petty and cruel and will hurt each other with words far worse than a black eye. Aidan lost interest when I went off on my rant and pointed out: 'but boo boos hurt.'
(OMG what if I have a girl someday?!)
KARATE FOR HER!
Did anyone ever see the movie Parenthood? There is this great scene towards the end where Jason Robards says to Steve Martin with regards to [Steve Martin's] 9 year old son having problems,
'It never ends. I'm 64. Larry's 27. He's still my son... .'
Throughout, it's the children who change the parents, the parents who suffer the growth pangs, who split at the emotional seams.
My mother always said that to me... No matter how old I am, (I'm 32) she will ALWAYS worry about me simply because I am her daughter.
I need to relax SOON, because he is only SIX... and I am having these emotions over him watching a bunch of older children on the school playground. AND HE WAS SMILING!!
Just being a kid, and watching.
[Quick little set up]
When my alarm clock went off at 6am, I decided we only need 20 minutes to get ready for school in the morning and since we have to leave my apartment by 7:30 to make it to the bus stop in time for Aidan to board, we can sleep until 7am. (Aidan almost ALWAYS crawls into my bed around 3am, coincidentally immediately after Eric leaves for work)
For some reason, I can't seem to 'get' my alarm clock buttons right. So instead of changing the alarm to 7am, I accidentally changed the TIME to 7am so when my body clock woke up at 7:52 I jumped out of bed realizing Aidan missed the bus.
Not that big of a problem because I own a car, and Aidan's school is about 15 minutes away and the doors open at 8:37am. Meaning, we didn't have to leave our apartment until about 8:20 for us to be at school on time. So, I'll be about 1/2 hour late for work, but I work alone in my own isolated office (a story for another day...) it's not a big deal.
The reason for this little backstory? I drove him to school early enough for him to play with the other children in the schoolyard before the doors opened. (he loves that)
[/Quick little set up]
(((how is THAT for a tangent...?)
[breathe]
ANYWAYS...
There were a bunch of 'big kids' who were obviously friends, playing some game of tag together on the monkey bars.. One of them was pretty fresh with the others & casually (but with a serious undertone) teasing everyone. Aidan just bounced around playing by himself, but I can tell he was watching the other kids, kinda wanting to playing with them. If someone teased another, calling them a 'poopy head' or whatever the cool thing to call someone in order to put them down is these days. (In my day, it was 'nice head' or 'jerkoff') Aidan would laugh along with them... and you can sense that he wanted to be involved but no one was noticing him.
[sn0rt] I always laugh when I think of the term...'nice head' WHAT DID THAT MEAN??? Neil McNeill ALWAYS said that to other people (the nasty little ****) and YES, I had a nasty neighbor named Neil McNeill. Scary thing is-- he was a JUNIOR. Cruelty X 2.
I know this is NOT an issue, but it breaks my heart or at least makes it beat a little harder for the little guy. He's always talking about 'the big kids' in the park and finding ways to impress them. It makes me just realize that one day he might get teased or feel left out.
Generally, EVERYONE likes Aidan. He gets along with other children extremely well and doesn't seem to have a shyness problem. He has no inhibitions with going up to a group of kids he doesn't know too well and involving himself.. (Jesus, where'd he get THAT from...)
[another tangent]-- my boyfriend has an issue sometimes because when we go out, I talk to a lot of people.. That's how WE met, ya know? i.e: I'm not shy.
[/another tangent]
I don't know why I'm so worried. Aidan has a lot of self confidence (of course i'm still pondering at what EXACT age we lose our innocence of just being ourselves...) I think this is part of the reason if not THE MAIN reason I enrolled him in Karate classes. If you KNOW you can kick someones ***, you have a lot more confidence in yourself... Simply put, but am I wrong?
And I KNOW I have bitched about this before.
[yes, another tangent in the form of a story]
Let's get real, Most of life's lessons are first taught on the playground. Aidan was once the *new kid in the playground* and he's still at the age where no one really intimidates him. It doesn't surprise me that he blindly runs over to a group of older boys who were playing in the pile of dirt kids in the city use as a sandbox. Edging his way into the action one of them (an evil looking little piece of ****) stops the group & hollars:
'You can't play with us.. You're new. And you're probably in Pre-K'
If I remember correctly, this is the same little piece of **** that upon his arrival to the grounds one afternoon, notices Aidan playing with a bunch of other kids, stops his bike.. says to his friend:
'Who's that chump?' I assumed he was the mayor of the playground and I can only imagine this kid in High School.
I swore to myself, that when Aidan reached school age, and may be subjected to *teasing* that it will take every ounce of my energy to stop me from getting all Hand that Rocks the Cradle on anyone who dares to bother my sweet innocent angel of a child. You know the scene where Rebecca Demorney goes to the play ground and tells the bully to stop ******* with the little girl she's watching. That would be me.
Unscathed and unaffected, Aidan still tried to nuzzle his way in on the sand action as I just stood there, grabbed my heart, and watched. 'They'll work it out... they'll work it out...' I repeated to myself over & over as again, the little ****, this time with an entire chorus chanted:
'You're a baby... you're in Pre-K..'
And aidan's face turned into the angry stay-puff marshmallow man & replied:
'I'm not a baby!!'
This time, as the little trooper tried to penetrate the dirt sand circle, the boys physically blocked him out, even pushing him at times. By now, the moms of the older boys came running over to scold them for teasing. Of course, the little **** was left with a baby sitter who was on the other side of the playground chasing his toddler sister around. (She'll probably be the neighborhood whore one day.)
Always thinking on my toes, I grabbed the Spider-Man plane my brother Ben gave him for his birthday that we could not quite figure out yet, pumped it up & threw it as hard as I could. The darn thing took off & flew above the parking lot, 2 garages and made a quick turn towards one of the buildings. It quickly diffused the situation as all the boys went
'WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAH' and ran towards it. All I could think of was: 'wow. the damn thing actually works.'
Of course, after Aidan & I returned to the park having retrieved the plane, they all surrounded him. Patting him on the shoulders, they were falling over themselves asking if they could have a turn next. Aidan, god bless his little heart was all excited & jumped around saying 'Ok, ok guys....' He was just so happy they were even talking to him... Hell, he's a better person than me, I would have told them to go **** themselves.. Especially the little ring-leader.
Then it hit me. My baby... my beautiful innocent little baby is entering a world of mean-spirited children and will most probably get teased for something or another. Just watching his innocence that day brought tears to my eyes, because he DOESN'T know how to be mean. He doesn't know when someone is even making fun of him he is that innocent. I don't know how long that innocence lasts... When do our children lose that sense of security? Watching how quickly the other boys turned against him within the time the little ******* who held the conch snapped his dirty little hands, scared me. Although I stayed out of it, I am not always going to be around to protect him. For goodness sakes, he is entering Kindergarten in a New York City public school this coming September. He might as well put away his Thomas the Tank ENgine toys & start playing with guns. He'll probably loose his virginity by 8, I mean let's face it: This is a generation that's lost an even bigger piece of innocence. This is a generation that lives with the everyday threat of violence in their schools. I'm going to elaboate on that thought later, but all I know is, we survived last Saturday.
Eventually the kids were all running about playing with each other, being civil. I heard through the network of moms at the playground that the little **** is a troublemaker. Luckily, I'm not the only one who thinks so.
(Ooooooh I will drop that kid on his *** so hard if he pulls any more **** with my baby)
As we were leaving Aidan was yelling at the top of his lungs
'Goodbye Nicholas... Goodbye Thomas... goodbye Donovan...'
No one was listening. God he's so sweet sometimes it makes me want to cry.
Later in the evening, I asked Aidan how he felt when the boys wouldn't let him play with him.. He didn't even bat an eye and said
'Oh they were just mean to me because they thought I was new, but I told them I'm not new anymore.'
You're certainly right kiddo. You just survived the playground.
Jesus, who could even THINK of being cruel to this face:
[heart melts]
Is it ever going to end? Aidan said the other day that girls are lucky because they don't have to worry about being beat up. Yes, I told him.. but girls are MEAN to each other. Of course I went off on a tangent about how girls are petty and cruel and will hurt each other with words far worse than a black eye. Aidan lost interest when I went off on my rant and pointed out: 'but boo boos hurt.'
(OMG what if I have a girl someday?!)
KARATE FOR HER!
Did anyone ever see the movie Parenthood? There is this great scene towards the end where Jason Robards says to Steve Martin with regards to [Steve Martin's] 9 year old son having problems,
'It never ends. I'm 64. Larry's 27. He's still my son... .'
Throughout, it's the children who change the parents, the parents who suffer the growth pangs, who split at the emotional seams.
My mother always said that to me... No matter how old I am, (I'm 32) she will ALWAYS worry about me simply because I am her daughter.
I need to relax SOON, because he is only SIX... and I am having these emotions over him watching a bunch of older children on the school playground. AND HE WAS SMILING!!
Just being a kid, and watching.
