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Playground Wallflower
There is no question that people with children delight in torturing those who are pregnant or merely mulling over the idea of having kids. There are certain phrases that are universal to these needling sessions:
"You got to go to a restaurant? With kids you never get to eat out."
"After you have a baby you won't get to go to the movies any more."
"You'll never be able to go on a grown-up vacation with children."
Since these pronouncements tended to come from people who ate out, saw movies and clearly chose not to travel, it was hard to think too much of them; but one friend did manage to cast a dark cloud on my kid plans.
Above all maternal requirements, S. despises playground time. She isn't pressed into service there now, but she made no bones about saying that it is boring beyond belief. She always longed for greater effervescence on these prolonged excursions and felt that if people were more inclined to show up with thermoses of mixed drinks, liveliness and conviviality would replace the tedium.
Having spent some time negotiating junglegyms with various children not my own, I tend to agree that the entire experience could be helped with a little lubrication. Not forgotten is one particularly trying afternoon spent on a western-themed playground. I was an invited guest of a couple with toddlers, and excursion would have driven me to drink were it not too early on a Sunday to be served. It is difficult to illustrate the misery of the day. No conversation was possible because the parents I was accompanying were either chatting with other parents or supervising their children. There was none of that getting-to-know-you cheer with the other parents, who were skeptical of my childless presence, and the toddlers themselves were playing with people their own size and had no use for me. I felt very much like the beleaguered family dogs that dozed, tied up on the outside of the fence that surrounded the playground (they're are strictly verboten on city playgrounds). That Sunday I was, quite literally bored to tears.
I don't suppose my suffering was somehow unique. According to a little article in a recent issue of the increasingly desperate New York Magazine, playgrounds are full of all the intrigue, competitiveness, scandal and hair pulling that created the delicate fabric of that era called Middle School. Apparently, the city's play yards veritably bubble with social complications, competitions, snobbery, snubbery, "popular girl" benches, and that hot-button teenage girl character that made the rounds on the talk show circuit a few years ago the "Queen Bee."
People, faced with vaguely dull, low-stakes activities like swing-pushing and jungle gym-spotting are particularly susceptible to social pettiness. Adding a touch of the soap opera to otherwise blah daily outings must make quite the difference. Instead of wanting to chew their limbs off to escape, these women can create intrigue among compatriots and study every comment for hidden insults, while deluding themselves that their superiority is earned by having made better parenting choices.
These articles irk me because they contribute to a really weird portrait of contemporary mothers, singling them out as regressive and catty. Perhaps it is just my rather jaundiced view of people, but I think everyone is capable of being cliquish and self-righteous. It is a quirk of the contemporary press that it that wants to pathologize the behavior of mothers, when really the whole world is prone to being cruel and snarky. Am I deluding myself in saying this? Please tell me that everyone, not just mothers, has the potential for elitist ostracism. To think otherwise would make one feel a little, well, doomed.
I have yet to enter a playground with Felix, but the rumor that this is an unavoidable snake pit makes one tremble a bit. One of the benefits I've enjoyed while being a nominal grown-up is relative freedom from early adolescent social dynamics. It would indeed be saddening to feel my old seventh-grade self rearing her rumpled head again. For now I'll comfort myself with the thought that the mean mommies are the cynical invention of a desperate magazine. If it isn't, I'll have to take a cue from Kay Thompson's Eloise who proclaims: "Being bored is not allowed," and make the best of things, but I'm not sure I can bring myself to pack a personal flask for these outings and be the lone tipsy mom by the swingset. Between Felix and me, one of us should be able to make it home upright, and I don't fit in the stroller.
posted by Elise at 7:56 PM
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Ella van Wainwright said...
Like so many other aspects of parenting, playground duty isn't nearly as bad as it's billed to be. You go because your child loves it. You push her on the swings, you chase her around the jungle gym, you help her onto the slide, and then you decide, after an hour or so, that it's time to go home. I work and therefore go to the playground only in the evenings and weekends, so maybe I'm missing out on some of the nuances of social competition, but I really don't think it's that big a deal.
I'm guessing the reason you found it so horrifically boring when you went with your friends was that you didn't have your own toddler. Watching your kid scream with glee on the swings can make up for a lot of tedium.
5/11/2005 7:15 AM
said...
One thing I might suggest, when your playground days begin, is to pretend you're a sitter or an aunt instead of a Mom. I have done much playground duty over many years, as a daycare worker, babysitter and aunt. I must admit that I mostly enjoy it but would probably enjoy it much less if I were a Mom. As a non-Mom caregiver, I'm free to enjoy the sunshine and the sights/sounds of happy children without being forced to engage in Mom-talk (competitive, kvetchy; gossipy.) Other caregivers leave me alone because they assume (since my skin color is the same as that of my charge(s) that I'm a Mom.
For me, playground time has been mostly an oasis of serenity, whether I'm engaged with the child(ren) or just watching them play.
It's a safe, happy space (there are too few of those.)
I guess Moms want to talk with other Moms (despite some of the drawbacks of "Mom talk") because, if they don't, they are isolated.
I DO understand the need for adult conversation. (As a childfree by choice person who works with children and loves them, I feel that I have the very best balance of kid-time and adult-time.)
Phooey. I know there are Moms (and Dads) who enjoy playground time. I'm rambling now.
Anyway; I hope you (Elise) can find a way to enjoy it.
5/11/2005 7:52 AM
Ang said...
You know, people can say all they want about the "joy of pushing your toddler on the swing"....but the truth is that some of us just don't enjoy it all the time. Some of us also do not enjoy getting our nails done, shopping at the mall or watching movies with J Lo in them-all things that are supposed to be "fun" for most women; but that's okay. There is this myth surrounding parenthood that it is supposed to be the crescendo of existence, and that everything about it is so great and vindicating. While there are certainly moments of pure bliss involved in being a parent, there is also alot of boredom and frustration that goes along with it-just like anything else. In the end, the experience of parenthood is exactly what you choose to make it; that's not to say that life after baby doesn't change, but it doesn't have to overhaul who you are or what you like to do.
That said, I assure you that mothers do not have the market cornered on middle school snobbery, clique-ishness and queen-bee syndrome. Walk into many female-dominated places of business, your local gym or salon and you'll see the same judgy-judgy stuff that goes on at the playground. As the "odd girl out" since childhood, I find this discouraging, but it's a fact of life that I've learned to deal with in the best way I know how-teaching my own daughter not to partake in it or be victimized by it the way I was.
5/12/2005 6:13 AM
said...
All I can say is, bring a book. I haven't partaken of playground duty yet (my daughter was too little in the winter, and now it's too hot here in Phoenix to step beyond the air-conditioned confines of my home), but I'd take a book. She doesn't need all of my attention all of the time, and I'm social phobic, so I'm not going to be talking to the other moms, anyway. Book.
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