Lessons In Helicopter Parenting
When you find yourself trapped in a car with three very loud five-year old girls, I think the only appropriate response is to try your damnedest to ignore them. Which is exactly what I did on Saturday when I had the good fortune of hauling these three to a birthday party:
Three good kids. Really. Even when they're together and their IQs drop by the obligatory way-too-many-points (as often happens when a group of screeching girls forms), they're really very well-behaved.
But loud.
OMG. So loud.
Especially the one that belongs to me. I don't know what her deal is, but she turns into Megaphone Mouth when she has an audience.
I gave them control of the radio and did everything I could to ignore them as they sang Justin Bieber songs at the top of their lungs. It worked really well on the way to the birthday party, but then they ate cake and got to make their own ice cream sundaes. Ever watch a 5-year old make an ice cream sundae? They don't need ice cream. They need sprinkles. All of them. There will be no sprinkles for you because, seriously, they ate them all.
If you thought three 5-year olds were loud, you ain't heard nothing. Three 5-year olds hopped up on a sprinkle-rush are the loudest creatures on planet earth. As I drove across town after the party so that I could drop off the extra ones with their mom, I realized that there was no way I would survive the whole trip. I *had* to give them a chance to run off some energy or they were going to turn my car into a giant bouncing ball.
PARK. PLAYGROUND. ANYTHING.
We took a vote and the loud-mouthed girls decided they wanted to go to a playground for a little bit. As luck would have it, we were just passing one, so I quickly veered off the highway and pulled up to a playground that Alexis and I have never visited.
The playground is in a, well, "suspect" sort of neighborhood. The neighborhood isn't bad by any means, but it has a reputation for being bad. Reality just doesn't quite live up to urban legend. Reality says that the neighborhood is filled with lower income families who are doing their best to get by and you best not do anything to mess that up because they take a lot of pride in their neighborhood. It's clean and it's just as safe as any public playground in the suburbs.
As soon as I let the Three Loud-Mouths escape the car, they took off running for the slides and swings. If I thought I was doing a good job of ignoring them, they quickly taught me that I had much to learn about the Art of Ignoring. They wanted nothing to do with me. Don't look at them. Don't take any photographs. Just go away and let them do their thing.
The very second the Three Loud-Mouths began to mingle with the kids who live in the neighborhood, I noticed it. The difference.
While I was keeping a close eye on the little monsters who were under my care, the other kids were without guarded parental supervision. I was the helicopter *whoop*whoop*whooping* over the scene while the other parents were waaaaaaaay over by the houses chatting with one another. They could see their kids, but they couldn't hear them. They were monitoring their kid's safety, but from a distance.
A distance that I wouldn't be willing to maintain. I work hard to ignore my kid when she's being obnoxiously loud, but I do it at close proximity, mostly so I can take a few photographs.
And she hates it.
Each minute that passed was filled with pleas from the Three Loud-Mouths for me to go get a hobby or something. "You can sit in the car!" they suggested. "You don't have to watch us!" they said. "Moooooooooooom! Check your email or something!" Alexis begged. They wanted to play and jibber jabber and generally be crazy and my helicopter action was cramping their style.
Meanwhile, the other kids were literally begging me to notice them. "Take my picture!" one cried.
"Look at me!" another cried out.
"Can you take my picture, please?" another politely urged.
"Me next! Me next! I look really pretty today!" another said.
A half dozen kids, each clamoring more than the last as they all fought for my attention. They all fought to be seen. They all wanted a moment in the shadow of a helicopter mom.
The moment the Three Loud-Mouths realized I had begun capturing the joyous eyes of the kids who had been at the playground before us (Seriously, scroll back up and look. Are those not the the most beautifully happy eyes you have ever seen?), everything changed. Suddenly they wanted to be the center of my universe.
It turns out it's not that awful to have a helicopter hovering over you as you play after all.
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
Reader Comments (9)
Beautiful pictures!!
Love the picture of the 3 of them! In Juliana's K class last week all of her classmates asked to have their pictures taken and smiled - they must have parents who don't always have a camera at the ready.
What kind of parent gives a room full of girls access to a sundae bar with all the sprinkles they can eat?
@Jennifer--I don't know, but I think they make a Chipmunks card for that. ;-)
Days like that are made for being a helicopter parent. So many beautiful smiling faces.
I am so happy that you took them to run off the crazy. It worked a little. Loving the pictures!
@Jennifer--payback is imminent!
I dunno. There's a little boy (a little brother of one of the runners on Oldest Boy's cross country team) and the INSTANT he sees me coming he clambers for my attention...even though his mom is right next to me, usually fussing over my OWN kids. Sometimes, it's just fresh meat. Or the idea that someone different wants to take their photo.
On the other hand, I'm always sad when I see a child who is missing and the only/best photo they have to distribute to the media is their school picture. :( Some people just don't take photos. And some of us take way, way, WAY too many.
PS Two words: Ear.Plugs.
This is the best post ever.
I've had similar things happen at the playgrounds we go to. I suppose I'm a "helicopter parent". Maybe it's because FireGirl's only 3, although other parents don't seem to care. But no matter where we go there always seems to be that one (at least one) kid whose parent(s) are far away, not paying any attention, while the kid begs us to play with them, even asked us to push them on the swing, help them on the monkey bars, etc. I always feel so weird about it. But then again, I would never be so far away from my kid either.
Oh my gosh, I adore this. Those smiles say it all. :)