Playdate: When Two Moms Don’t See Eye to Eye But The Kids Do
What makes for a good playdate in your neck of the woods? Is it the moms or the kids? I hate to admit that the closer my daughter gets to picking her own friends, the more I’m dreading it.
A recent post by boxing commentator and playgroup mommy Karyn Bryant really drove home the conundrum for me. Like me, she’s a tomboy – although her description seems more specific than mine. I’m not one for sitting around “talking about breeding,” like the moms she rags on, but I’m not ready to kick it with the boys and cigars either. I’ll leave that to Karyn. But I feel her pain. I crave conversations that don’t begin with BPA and end with Yobaby.
It’s something I’ve noticed a lot of dads just don’t get. One friend’s husband invited a co-worker and his wife to their son’s first birthday party. “Oh, she just had a baby, you’ll love her,” he assured her. The woman came, and she was a dud. She sat on the couch and every attempt at conversation fell flat. We shrugged and moved on. But my friend’s husband kept bringing her up. “Why don’t you invite her over? Why don’t you give her a call? Set up a playdate, go shopping.”
Finally, she had to break it to him. Having two recently renovated uteruses is not the makings of a the relationship of the century. You need chemistry, not just kids.
For Bryant, that means a mom who’ll watch the Friday night fights. For me, it’s a mom who can agree with me that we keep one eye on the kids and another on the margaritas. Or, at the very least (if it’s before noon), kick back and talk about something, anything besides the kids. What my daughter’s looking for in a playdate is, of course, very different. She wants to go play with the kids she’s meeting out and about – whether Mommy likes their mommies or not.
I’m happily at the helm of my daughter’s social calendar for the moment, with a list of moms of whom I heartily approve and kids she’s known most of her little life. We’ll just hold out hopes that any would-be social climbers have moms who can make the list.
Related Posts:
Five Ways to Spot a Stalker Mom – So You Can Run
Nanny 911 – Back On Our Side of the Pond
They Say: Mamas Should Suck It Up in Playgroups
