Dear Damien
NS October 18th, 2007
Today, sitting in a bouncy castle with the Noble Child at a playgroup we go to once a week, I spotted a boy, probably around four years old, wearing a t-shirt that said “Boys are better than girls.” I thought it was so tacky and so sexist, I couldn’t help but keep my eyes on him for awhile, waiting to see which smug soccer mom he wandered over to when he would inevitably fall over and bang his head or knee (I swear it wasn’t me!). I noticed as I watched the kid that he was pretty hyper and aggressive, pushing other kids off of slides and yanking their toys away. A real charmer, the kind that makes you think for just one split second that spanking is overdue a comeback.
His mother was oblivious to the mayhem her son was causing, making other kids cry left and right and forcing every parent there to keep an extra close eye on their kids lest this brat beast made his way towards their own offspring. At one point, he tried to haul this other kid out of a play car and was smacking him in the head while pulling on his shirt. The mother of the child being assaulted tried to separate them and had her glasses knocked off her face as thanks for her efforts. Appalled, she retreated and glanced around the room for the devil spawn’s mother but no one was fessing up to being his handler. Next thing she knows, the kid walks up to her friend who is holding a very small baby in her arms, and whacks the baby on the head with a toy. The baby starts screaming, the baby’s mother starts crying and the kid just runs around sticking his tongue out.
Finally, the commotion aroused the Brat Beast’s mother out of her conversation on the other side of the room (with her back to the play area, naturally) and scurrying over to grab him and make a weak apology. She marched him back over to her seat and forced him to sit down by her feet, and then….gave him a cookie and went back to her conversation. That kid wolfed down the cookie and was back on his feet in ten seconds flat and the woman just ignored him completely. You could see everyone else’s eyes locking, eyebrows raising and lots of grumbling going on. It is parents like this woman who give the rest of us a bad name for taking children out in public. Because of people like her, I can’t take my kid to a restaurant that doesn’t have paper placemats and crayons without being given the hairy eyeball. Bitch.
Not five minutes later, someone can running in and said “He’s opened the gate and they’re getting out!” Mothers were scrambling to get to the gated outdoor area just off the room and wrangle children who had escaped and were heading towards the nearby park. The ringleader of this charade was, of course, Brat Beast.
At that point I decided we’d had enough and went to leave. While I was gathering our things and putting my daughter’s jacket on her, the Beast sidled up to me. I looked down at his head and had to stop myself from parting his hair to look for the 666 that was surely emblazoned on his skull. He touched my leg and smiled up at me and for a minute, I melted a little. I smiled back and felt badly for judging him so quickly. I said “Hey there, little guy.” His angelic smile turned to a sneer and he replied with the oh-so-endearing “Whatever, GIRL.” I pointed at his t-shirt and said “Wanna bet, punk?” His four year old brain didn’t register what I’d said, thank goodness, so I made my getaway before he could go ask his mother what ‘punk’ meant.
I’m so getting the Noble Child a pair of steel-toed Docs when she starts school.
