Forever Family

Did you know that for the most part, we are emotionally stunted 14 year old teenagers?

We’ve never left high school.  We still act and think like a bunch of horny, giggly, silly little teenagers.  Yuck!

This is not the first time I’ve come to this conclusion.  After all, I work in silly corporate America.  It’s a haven of pubescent conduct.  

If you’ve been following along, you know I was off last week on furlough.  It’s the closest I’ve been to not working since I started working.  It was great.  I got to be a stay at home mom for the first time ever.  

The gods were smiling down upon me and graced my furlough with fabulous weather.  It was in the high 70’s, the sun was shining, the time had changed so we had long evenings, and spring is in full rage.  Cherry and magnolias are blooming, and flowers are sprouting from the ground.  The grass has turned a merry shade of green.  So we spent lots of time at the park, going to baby gym, walking, visiting the library, and just getting out as much as possible.  

As I hit all the typical SAHM hot spots, I began to notice a few things.

First, I was clearly an outsider.  I was regarded coolly and distantly by the other moms, who obviously were experienced in the ways of park attendance.  As I pushed my son on the swing, I caught glances and snickers from the other clusters of moms scattered around the playground.  

At first, it didn’t bother me.  I could really care less what they thought.  But I even tried to be nice and spark up some conversation, and all I got was the cold shoulder.

HELLO!!!  THIS ISN’T BEVERLY HILLS 90210!!!!  GET OVER YOURSELVES!!!!!

After being snubbed and so clearly off put by grown ups, I started to wonder what was wrong with me.  My self confidence was quite bruised.  Ok, so I was soooo glad to be off work that I didn’t spend much time in front of the mirror trying to make myself look nice.  Sure, my hair was pulled back in a ponytail and I wasn’t wearing a lick of makeup and my tshirt and mom jeans might not be fresh off the runway, but it’s the park!  I want to play with my son!  I want to build sandcastles and go down the slide!  It’s kinda hard to do that in a strapless dress (and yes, one of these moms preferred strapless dresses).  Did they judge me for not looking nice like them?

Was it because my stroller is just a plain old Graco and not some Peg Perego?

Did they find my early 90’s Volvo station wagon too unsexy?

Did my butt look too big in my mom jeans?

I started to regress to some old feelings about being inadequate and awkward, but stopped myself.  Look at these women.  They are stuck in high school.  They have their little cliques and their image to uphold, but I’m pretty sure my kiddo and I were the only ones really having any fun.

Then there were the nannies, who clearly do not mix with the moms.  They were at least a little more friendly, and I wondered if they would have been more so.  They appeared a little shocked that I even said anything to them.  Although, most of them are so fresh out of high school that they haven’t really had time to know anything else, so I forgive them their behavior.

I started to look forward to our outings as an opportunity for some social observation. 

Sure you had your nannies and your moms, but then there were subgroups in those classifications.

In the moms, there was the designer moms.  These were the ones dressed to the hilt, looking beautiful and flawless with their perfect nails and high heel sandals, hair coifed and legs smooth and tanned.  They clustered around a bench, because it’s impossible to maintain that look anywhere near the sandbox or equipment.  Their children cried a lot.  They were likewise dressed in name brand clothes, and often looked longingly at the sandbox.  If a mom caught them yearning for a romp in the sand, they typically got yelled at.

Then there were the athlete moms.  They were all in the matching jogging suits, with their jogging strollers.  Their kids seemed to at least be enjoying themselves, but there was a lot of schedules and clock watching with this group.  They also owned a very interesting and colorful collection of water bottles.  

Next we come to the preggo moms.  I wondered if this group was women who knew each other before and happened to all get pregnant at the same time, or if they all met at the lobby of their OB/GYN.  It was just odd to me that this many women knew each other so well and were all coincidentally pregnant.  Track suits were the attire of choice for this group as well, but they worked in the makeup, nails, and hairdos of the designer group.  They were camped out on the picnic tables, sharing pregnancy stories.

Then there was the earthy moms.  They at least appeared more my kind, ’cause they were attired in jeans.  However, their shirts were plastered with causes they support, and they toted around their organic snacks in earth-friendly tote bags.  They looked down their noses at me when I gave my son a Mott’s juice box (I’m pretty sure I heard one say “so much sugar”).  These were the ones who did EVERYTHING with their kids, and I’m pretty sure one of them even got stuck in a tunnel meant for toddlers.  Stop bouncing around already!  

The nannies were much easier to classify.  They mostly were all very young and very cute (I wondered about some of the dads in these households.  After all, it’s an old story…).  They basically fell into 2 categories…English speaking and non-English speaking.  Some were Hispanic, there were some Czech ones (4 of them, surprisingly enough), and another group that I think was speaking French (Canadians?).  Of all these nannies, they either clustered together and spoke their native tongue, or they branched out and spoke with other nannies in English.

It was definitely interesting, and I’m sad to say that no lasting friendships came out of any of that, even for Kiddo.  He’s usually good about finding a child on the playground to have fun with, but I’m pretty sure he picked up on this vibe, too.  The only partial success we had was with a Grandma and her 2 granddaughters.  We talked for a while as we pushed our kids on the swings, and Kiddo ran around a bit with the oldest.  It was clear she was a loner in the group too, so we had that in common.  

It’s too bad that even though we’re in our 20’s, 30’s, 40’s, or even 50’s; and even though we’re a sisterhood of mothers, we’re still lost in stupid superficial details.  

I’ll admit, I’m probably as much to blame as them.  After a few attempts at being friendly, I stopped trying.  It’s likely by the end of the week, a mom looked at me and thought “what a snob!”

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