Wednesday, March 10

Unsolicited Parenting Advice

Somebody must have put some crazy in the water this week.

Yesterday at the Autry museum, a woman interrupted me from discussing the tin toys on display with Matilda. This random stranger went on to say how I should talk with Matilda about what she is seeing. That she sees so many mothers walking through the museum and not even interacting with their kids. I just nodded my head in agreement with her looney talk & tried not to encourage her. After she wandered away I went back to interacting with my daughter in a game of I spy.

Then today I ran into another helpful stranger as I was walking down the sidewalk, talking to Tim on the cellphone with Porter napping on the front of me in a carrier. This man yelled at me with googley eyes bulging, "Oh you're talking on the TELEPHONE!" He then mumbled about talking with my kid as he passed. Maybe he thinks naps are overrated for babies and that we should wake them to provide a constant barrage of stimulation all day long for maximum brain development.

2 comments:

Adam said...

In an almost unrelated note: Tonight at about 10:15 I was taking out the soiled diapers for the diaper service and as I was on the sidewalk a shady-looking gangbanger (I affectionately call all young men out on my street out at this time of night, "gangbanger" - although really only about 90% actually are gang members) passed by me and sneezed. I took a moment to ponder whether or not to say, "God bless you" when he sneezed again and I just said it. Without skipping a beat, he thanked me. Now maybe I'm jaded or racist or both - but the exchanged tickled me. It made me feel good and made me feel a little sad at the same time. Sad, because I doubted that it was appropriate for me to say, "God bless you" to a stranger, who was about my age, walking down the street. Sad also, because I didn't expect that he would be so quick to thank me.

I also took a moment to think about what odd expression, "God bless you" is - after someone sneezes. Seems really archaic, and yet, so common. Then I robbed him.

-Adam

Hugh said...

I have always said that other people were put here for your enjoyment, good job baiting the idiots to reveal themselves. G-pop