Suburban Goddess

Friday night was “Alex’s night,” where she gets to choose the agenda for the evening. It’s no surprise that we usually end up somewhere with fast food, which is perfectly fine by me as long as she’s happy. We loaded up the Jeep and headed out to McDonald’s.  Alex is in a phase now where she has to bring one of her “animals” for comfort and security, so I didn’t mind that she wanted to bring her “lion.”

This lion has been around over 10 years; it has history. I used to work in a mom & pop printer shop many years ago, and the second part of their business included a trade show division. Half of my friends got to travel the country to food shows, while the rest of us were chained to a desk sniffing acetone from the horrible ventilation in the production area. It was no secret that I was jealous, so my friend Randy would try to make up for it by bringing back various marketing items from the shows. That’s how Lion came into my possession. For a while, he had a shirt that said “Sysco Syracuse.” So Lion is from New York. That means he’s a bad ass lion.

Anyway, Lion stayed in my possession for years; first at the bottom of a box, then as a reminder of where I came from (right next to Herschel, the Cracker Barrel bear), and then somehow, Alex came across him after we moved. She was immediately attached to him.

I’m always wary of letting her bring her toys in places she might leave them behind. It’s not the fact that toys are expensive; any parent knows that the meltdown that ensues when a kid loses something is far worse. But against my better judgement, I allowed her to bring lion in with her. After all, she had a captive audience. What else does one do at a McDonald’s playground but watch your child and pray for duct tupe?

We were in no hurry, so Alex played close to an hour. I watched Lion on the ledge, down the slide, over the padded whirly things… Lion was getting quite a workout. But as we were getting ready to leave, Lion disappeared.  And so the meltdown ensued.

There’s nothing that breaks a mother’s heart more than watching her child cry for something out of love. It’s one thing for them to have a brat meltdown, but it’s something entirely different when they are genuinely distraught because they can’t find something important to them (just ask Pixar. They made millions). So, as a mother, you feel obligated to help them look for it.

Which means you may have to climb to the top of a three story playground, despite the fact that you have a raging case of claustrophobia and you are praying that the flimsy plastic will not notice that extra “baby weight” you still have no excuse for not losing four years later.

The nice thing about those pre-fab playgrounds is that there are few places something can hide.  Lion was no where to be found, which left only one alternative… Lion had been abducted. Alex didn’t understand that an Amber alert is not appropriate for a 8 inch plush lion, so she began the heartbreaking wail that tugs at my mother bear heart… if I found the kid who stole her Lion, there would be consequences.

As we prepared to leave, Alex still crying in my arms, my mother pointed across the room.  A small girl was banging the Lion against the table in front of her father. When I followed her finger to turn to look, he took the lion and put it in his newborn’s carrier. Our eyes met for a minute, and he quickly looked down.

Do you not HEAR my child crying for her toy? Do you not KNOW that it does not belong to you? Do you realize that you are teaching your child that taking something that does not belong to her is OKAY?

I was livid.

Meanwhile, Alex had caught on to what my mother was pointing at, and immediately recognized her toy. “Mommy, that’s my lion!”  For a moment I was torn; did I do it for her, or did I teach her to fight her own battle? I tried the first approach.

“Alex, just go ask the little girl for your lion back.”

“But Mommy, she STOLE IT.”

I tried to convince her to do it, but she couldn’t find the courage. I knew what I had to do. I walked over to the man and pointed to the lion.

“That belongs to my daughter,” I said, pointing to Lion. He looked down sheepishly.

“Oops. Sorry.”

And that simple sentiment, that insincere apology, made me furious at all the irresponsible parents in this country today. Perhaps because the police assume that it was a kid who broke into my house, who is probably flaunting a 17″ Powerbook and a $2000 camera at school without any recourse. I personally know parents who have looked the other way when their child comes home with high-dollar items with no possible way to pay for them.

Where do you think this stuff comes from? And why aren’t you asking your kid?

It starts with a Lion. It ends up as felony.

In this case, we had a happy ending. But it made me very aware of the fact that there are parents who will not teach their children right and wrong. It’s one thing for you to end up with something that doesn’t belong to your kid… it happens to all of us. But when a kid is having a complete meltdown in front of you because something is missing, and your child is standing right in front of you with it in your hands… damn people!  Do the RIGHT THING.

I weep for the future.

This entry was posted on February 22, 2009 at 6:43 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.