Mommyblogging! Mommyblogging! Mao-myblogging!

I'm going to do some MOMMYBLOGGING.

I was going to all this time. I started this particular blog in 2005 after another blog from 2001-2004 (RIP).

I wanted to mommyblog but I failed miserably at that. The reasons are complex and also I cannot explain them.

But today I had a mommy INCIDENT that I must share.

Picture, if you will, a small playground. An afterschool program, the beauty of Fall, the innocence of children.

Young afterschool daycare person: Something happened today with Chiquita.

Me: Oh, what?

YADP: She had a piece of candy in her underpants. She was touching it in there and I asked her where it was. She said that daddy gave it to her last night for being a good girl and she was going to eat it when her mommy and daddy got there.

Me: Uh, well, yeah. Sometimes the things she says...Uh.

YADP: Daddy gave it to her for being a good girl. At night.

Me: Uh, right. Well, her stories usually require some digging around. I'll try to find out what happened.

YADP: I made her throw it away and wash her hands.

Me: What kind of candy was it again.

YADP: A tootsie roll.

Me: Um. We never give her tootsie rolls.

Is this not THE WEIRDEST CONVERSATION. I mean, implicity I felt like she was stating that my husband was some kind of freaky child molester giving his daughter candy and telling her to put it in her underwear.

I was really tired. REALLY, REALLY TIRED. I am not good at assessing complex ways of answering innuendo in conversation. Also, I tend to be intimidated by authority figures, even when they are way younger than me, etc.

Me to my daughter: So what's the deal with this piece of candy. Did daddy give you a piece of candy?

Her: No.

Me: Where did you get the candy?

Her: I found it in a desk drawer.

Me: Why'd you put it in your underwear?

Her: I didn't put it in my underwear. I put it in my tights. (Smiling to herself): I nibbled a bit of it before I threw it away.

I realized afterward I was very, very nervous. Partly my extreme fatigue, partly just the weirdness of the conversation. And my own response, which almost took it on board that my husband could be reasonably under some suspicion. And my fear that my accepting this wench's authority in that way implies something--like she is the right person to discover the awful truth that my husband is some kind of underwear-candy fetishist.

I called my husband:

Me: Honey, Chiquita has a piece of candy in her underwear and she said you gave it to her for being a good girl.

Husband: No. What? What kind of candy?

Me: A tootsie roll.

Husband: But we don't have any tootsie rolls? Where did she get it?

Me: A desk. But now I'm freaking out that the woman at the school thought that you are a horrible child molester who tells our daughter to put tootsie rolls in her underwear.

Husband: (Because I've previously warned him about this and we've laughed about it) Yeah, they'll pick me up and I'll have all these pairs of underwear in my pockets.

He sometimes has her underwear in her pockets. Because she sometimes pees her pants. It's funny, because this is very typical. He anticipates problems like this. I don't. But every once in a while, I'll be like: What if you were searched or something and the police found little girl's underwear in your pocket?

I mean, this sounds so bad, doesn't it: HE CARRIES LITTLE GIRL'S UNDERWEAR IN HIS POCKETS.

There's something so odd about this. I mean, I know kids get molested by parents. But the sort of collective suspicion. You feel it.

I hate this afterschool. It's a prison camp. They are constantly yelling at the kids. The kids will be playing and hot and they make them wear their coats. IT'S A RULE. They are not allowed to touch each other or hug. THERE'S A RULE AGAINST THAT. A kid will pull the crayon bucket toward himself and get yelled at. I've come in and they've had them lined up against the wall for a group lecture because, apparently, they did not do something--come when called.  They get angry at them for leaning across the table to talk to each other. LOCKDOWN.

It's public school as prison. I think this might be a common underlying theme in urban public schools. Of course we could not possibly treat your child as an individual. Or acknowledge that they are five. Because the point is to modify their behavior to sit down and shut up and accept control and boredom. 

I feel afraid, in some odd way. For example, we co-sleep! What might someone make of that?

Comments

[slouchy]

Ugh. I hate the fog of suspicion over everything these days. Especially over anything concerning children.

[ozma]

I guess I need to know how weird that sounds. Isn't that like a typical thing a kid would do?

My kid is a bit weird. She makes up wild stories. I mean, that is normal for a five year old.

Is the afterschool woman being ridiculous? I think she is being ridiculous! I mean, suppose he did give her a piece of candy yesterday and she stuck it in her underwear. She doesn't have pockets.

[DoctorMama]

That is actually a pretty hilarious story. Not weird. We were at the liquor store the other day and my five-year-old, who makes us let him drink his water out of (washed out) beer bottles (I know! It's bad!), says, "Hey! Blue Moon! I drink that beer!" Fortunately no one who wasn't a wino was listening.

I agree, that afterschool program sounds hideous. I remember being forced to wear my winter coat at recess even though the temperature had shot up 20 degrees because of a rule like that. The really stupid thing was that my mother would never insist that I wear anything; if I got cold, it was on me.

I actually rumple the sheets in my son's never-used bed just before the cleaning lady comes. Is that paranoia, or what? And she doesn't even speak English.

[ozma]

Ha ha. Yeah, that's the kind of thing. Not to freak you out but a guy went camping with his kids. The kids got naked and swam in the creek. They took beer bottles and were using them with water to make sand castles. The parents took a picture of their naked kids frolicking on the beach, pouring water on the sand castles with beer bottles. When the pictures were seen (by the photo developer who sent them to DSS?) they took the kids away from the parents for a time. How screwed up is that?

Dr. M I cannot tell you that I am quite relieved you co-sleep. Also, like me, it sounds like you are kind of aware that there is general disapproval of the practice. We used to co-sleep. Once we moved out of our parents' bed we used to sleep in the same bed. Not really by plan. But we are from a co-sleeping culture, according to the website. Is that why? I don't know. But I think this is why we do it...It seemed weird to me when I had her to put her in a different bed and the first week my husband was like ??? and now I think he thinks it is weird for families to sleep apart.

But I want her to be sleeping in her own bed by 6. Probably a pipe dream, but I'm going to try.

A funny thing: I was in a book store and they had parenting books and I was like 'is there ANYTHING about how to get a 5 year old to sleep on their own?' So I read a part of a parenting book that is about kids' sleeping...Guess what their final suggestion was: "Consider a family bed. Many parents find this helps with childrens' sleep habits."

That was it--just that sentence. So I was wondering what problems we had avoided by co-sleeping...Since it is apparently a big problem solver!

[magpie]

Oh my God, they are bad. YOU ARE GOOD.

We co-sleep most of the time. I'm pleased when she goes to sleep in her own bed, but I miss her. And almost every night she comes climbing in at some point. And sometimes she simply won't go to sleep at all unless she's draped over me.

And yes - schools so often want everyone to behave exactly the same way. No touching among the little ones seems kind of extreme.