Our Neighbors Think We're Heathens
Wednesday, May 5, 2010 at 8:21AM My neighbors think we’re horrific parents.
I’m convinced of this is fact.
It’s spring, everyone’s outside, windows are open, wind’s blowing in the right direction…life couldn’t be better. We live in a very urban area – I can almost touch my house and my neighbor’s house at the same time.
So, I’m outside drinking wine and watching the kids live-out their childhood. Occasionally I’ll wave to a neighbor with that calm, collective, “what’s up man! Life’s good…just relaxing with the family” kinda wave.
Usually that’s the kid’s cue to go absolutely ballistic.
Immediately the boy yells “I said no Macy now STOOOOOP!!!!” Then rides away on his bicycle towards the corner of the street inches from going into traffic.
As I’m running down the sidewalk carrying wine, yelling “HONEY…GRAB MACY…SHE’S BLEEDING” I happen to notice half the neighborhood stopping mid-discussion and turning towards our rabid family.
“WHAT?!” my wife screeches from inside the house.
“GRAB MACY…GRAYSON MADE HER BLEED AND NOW HE’S RIDING HIS BIKE INTO TRAFFIC!!”
This is where I bring the scene to a screeching halt and reveal that we are actually the “older” family on the block. My kids are almost 6 and 8. The average age of the rest of the block’s children… 1.7 years old. So they’re standing there in horror as they watch elements of parenthood unfold that they have yet to experience.
As they gather their children and herd them away from the scene with disappointing looks on their faces I can almost hear them mumbling “we’ll never be like that will we George?”
“Never Marcia. We’ll never parent like those heathens!”
The neighborhood air is consistently filled with the loving ramblings of our family-of-four as sentiments such as these come flying out our house windows regularly:
“I said GO BRUSH YOUR TEETH!!! How many times do I have to ask you?”
“I AAAMMMM finishing in the shower…geeeeze!!”
“OOOOWWWW daddy!!! Your pulling my hair, let me comb it!!!”
“Mooooommmyyyyyyy Macy won’t stop snoring!!”
“NO! You cannot have a chocolate bar while you go to sleep!! That’s just insane! Now go to bed!!”
“But honey!!! I thought tonight was really going to be ‘the’ night!?”
I think back to before we had kids and I remember the many times in the grocery seeing the mother say to the little boy, “stop touching things on the shelf. Do you hear me?! One more time Mr. and you’re in BIG trouble.”
And I always thought…I’d never, NEVER talk to MY kids like that. Guess it goes to show the number one rule as a parent is never say “I’ll never.”
Now if I can get my wife to stop talking to me like that in the grocery…
Reader Comments (23)
Comedian Louis CK said he used to see parents yelling at their kids and feel bad for the kids. Now that he has kids of his own he says, "I wonder what that little s**t did to her??"
Have you developed the look yet? The one that all the kids has to do is see your face and they stop, knowing with all their childhood wisdom that they are about to face their mortality.
It's very satisfying.
Give them a few years... they'll be bring you bottles of wine to ask for your advice. Patience is a virtue they say.
I have wanted to flick my child with a comb more than once whilst grooming her and say, "I'll give you something to cry about."
I am just barely restraining myself.
What's odd is I'm usually telling my 4 year old to stop touching himself in the grocery store.
We're totally that loud family on the block, too. There are like 17 kids within a half mile radius - all under 7 - and we're the only ones yelling at kids to stop punching each other and to grab me another miller lite.
Ah, parenthood. My kids are younger than yours (4, 4, and 2) but you've described a typical day in our house. Thankfully we live in the boonies so there's not too many people around to give us those looks!
I completely know the feeling. Because we live in an apartment w/ thin walls I'm almost certain our neighbors think we beat our children or something. Then they always see us struggling to get the kids in the car in their car seats in the parking lot too. They all pretty much give us dirty looks all the time lol.
My husband and I discuss often what our neighbors think. We leave our back door open and my kids issue blood curdling screams every 10 to 15 minutes as part of their fits (they're 2 and 3). These screams sound like we just beat the hell out of them and then tied them up. Sometimes they will also hear a resounding "BE QUIET DAMMIT!" I am pretty sure our neighbors are about 2 seconds away from calling CPS everyday.
My favorite part of this is the image of you still holding onto your wine as you're running down the sidewalk to save your kid from biking into traffic. Hahahaha.
I found nothing out of the ordinary from this post, isn't this how every family interacts?
Don't leave us hanging, did you spill your wine?
The only reason our church is putting asses in the seat is to watch what my son might do. I think God is behind it, because each week the priest blesses him and the demon still lives and breathes. See God does whatever it takes to put asses in the seats, too.
And you just describe every night just after midnight in the French Quarter, some dude running after someone with drink in hand.
It's the same look non-parents give you when your kid is misbehaving in the store etc. I find that older parents w/ grown kids look and smile, single ppl w/ no kids or yuppies with newborns in fancy strollers are the ones always giving the nasty looks.
This is where living in BFE comes in super handy. Our nearest neighbor is 1/4 mile...we know we are being too loud when he calls us to tell us he can hear us. LOL then all i have to do is threaten my 3yo that hes coming over LMAO
and seriously..i thought this was normal...i agree with @uniqueblog...its the kidless, the yuppies, or the I'll Never parents that give us the dirty looks ;) lol
Before you know it, your kids will be older and your neighbor kids will be that age......doing those same things. You'll get to kick back, raise your glass to those parents as they dash to try and contain the little darlings before they kill themselves while your own children are inside the house totally ignoring you because...you know, you're so not cool enough to talk to or they'll be out and about. It does come full circle. Thank God.
I hear ya. We live on a relatively quiet crescent. My husband bought giant traffic cones, which we often put on the street when our kids are out playing. It means we can sit on our lawn chairs for longer when our spawn careen towards the road. Now there's quality parenting.
I've now done just about every "I'll never..." that I dared utter pre-kids. That phrase is the kiss of death.
Sounds like a normal night at our house-LOL!!! I am sure the neighbours must really get a kick out of me yelling at the top of my lungs "I told you two to stop yelling!!!!"
When I see the disapproving looks, I just say under my breath, GFY baby, GFY. Can't wait until one of my daughter's asks me what THAT means ;)
Raising a glass of wine in your general direction- Cheers!
LOL... ya know what? My husband would say before we had kids... "I'll never let my kids go out in public with their faces looking like that"... Yea, ummmm let's just say my kids look like children from the streets all summer long. Just sayin.
Awesome post!
Seriously.
It is all a matter of perspective. It gets better as the kids get older. My son has learned all sorts of colorful language from his friend's older brothers. Love it when he looks at me and says "ain't life a motherfucker."