Have you ever had an experience where you allowed yourself to be influenced by what another parent was doing instead of listening to your gut? How did that work out? If your experience was anything like the experience that I had today, it probably did not work out too well.
It started at the grocery store. Before we went in I reminded Dylan that since we had just had a snack, he would not be getting a snack at the store. To his credit, he did not ask me for a snack while we were at the store. He did ask me for nearly everything we saw that was not a snack.
After I talked him back from the brink of having a meltdown because I would not get him a watermelon cutting knife, I wheeled our cart away from the produce section. Then, another mom passed by with a girl about Dylan’s size in her cart. The girl was holding a stick with a wooden bug on the end of it. Dylan saw the bug on a stick and was instantly fixated on it.
As I looked at the bug on a stick, I noticed that it was not something which was intended to be a toy. It looked like a cheap, junky garden ornament that would last about two seconds in the hands of an enthusiastic child. It was an item which, when swung about by an enthusiastic child, could cause bodily harm to unsuspecting parents or baby brothers, or injury to household property. Something deep inside me said “bad idea”.
Dylan implored me to ask the woman where the girl had gotten the bug on a stick. I asked, and she cheerfully directed me to a display of floral supplies. “So cute”, she said, “and cheap entertainment”. My heart sunk. I had wanted her to tell me that it was a toy they had brought from home, or that they had gotten from another store, but no. I was stuck.
Despite my instinctual feeling that the bug on a stick would be nothing but trouble, I went over and got one for Dylan. He beamed as I handed it to him, and he began waving it around. Within minutes, he was using it to brush against items on the shelves as we passed by with the cart. I moved the cart to the center of the aisle so he could not reach.
As I pulled out of the parking lot, I could hear the bug tapping on the car window and I asked him to stop. He did not, and the tapping continued. We got home and he started dancing around the house, waving the bug to and fro. It bumped along the floor, it bumped into the wall. Again, I asked him to stop and I told him that if I heard the bug hit anything else, it would be put away. Moments later, it hit my leg. He had a giant tantrum as I put it up out of reach.
That silly bug on a stick is going to be the bane of my existence until it meets its demise. I regret buying it. In hindsight, I would much rather have dealt with Dylan having a fit at the store than to have that bug in my home. As silly as this story is, it serves as a reminder that I should follow my instinct and not let the actions of other parents influence what happens between myself and my children.