You know down at Disney I had a mouth full of cold sores from a sun burn the week before. I did my best to not be self concious about it but of course a teen age kids with his friends said in a very loud voice "HEY ANYBODY GOT SOME MEDICINE FOR MY HERPES". Well THAT pissed me off and I confronted him and embarrassed him to the point where he got out of line and left. When we got home I told the boys how mean it was for him to do something like that and my 11 year old said "Mom...some people are just jerks and there's nothing you can do to change them....you taught me that."
So I guess they do listen...and I'm glad the boys saw me stand up to the kid and saw him leave because he'd embarrassed himself so much. Oy...too many lessons to keep track of...d
It's hard to go through it, and hard to watch your kids go through it because you remember what it felt like. The "missing" friend called her yesterday and she seemed to be just fine when I got home from work. The situation also gave the kids and I an opportunity to talk about peer pressure and for me to reaffirm the policy that if they find themselves in a bad situation all they have to do is call me and I'll come get them. My son assured me that peer pressure wasn't a problem for him because, " I don't follow the trends, I set them." That got eyerolls from my daughter and me, but the little booger is right, he is a natural born leader. Very scary!
Well, the thing is, someone can't be "in" if someone else isn't "out". So, kids take turns making someone "out". It's mean. It seems that girls used to have the market cornered on that kind of meanness. Except now that there are so many anti-bullying campaigns against physical bullying, boys are learning the art of social isolation as well. I wish there was a cure for it. Somehow kids know which ones it matters to the most and you can bet that they're the ones who'll be chosen to be out.
Oh, and the biggest thing is that all of the adult platitudes of "pretend it doesn't matter" or "just ignore them" or "remember how it feels next time you're in and someone else is out" just don't work. The plain and simple fact is that it hurts to be the one on the outside.
Some people come into our lives and quickly go. Some stay for awhile and leave footprints on our hearts. And we are never, ever the same."
"The ultimate aim of karate lies not in victory or defeat but in the true perfection of one's character."
Well, the neighbor told me that the dogs charged him multiple times in his back yard before the guy showed up. He held them at bay with a shovel. When the guy called them they came to him and then the neighbor walked around front to find the guy beating the dogs. Guy told him the dogs are vicious and that one had bitten people before. Neighbor called police but said they were less than interested and simply sent a patrol car that drove by. I called the police and relayed my childrens' story and asked if anything had been done. The officer who answered the phone had no idea what had been done and really didn't seem interested at all. So now I have a man with two vicious dogs that lives a quarter of a mile from my home and can't seem to keep his dogs contained, and he beats the poor animals(no wonder they are mean) and the police don't seem to want to do anything about it. I have a contact on the board of the local Humane Society, guess I'll give her a call and see what she thinks.
Speaking of mean....nothing meaner than girls between the ages of 12-15. Got a phone call last night from a mom of one of my daughter's friends. She wondered if I knew where her daughter might be. Seems a bunch went to a local waterpark/game facility and she thought my daughter would have been invited. My daughter gave her a couple names/numbers to try, but the look on her face when she hung up just killed me. She had obviously been selected as the one to be excluded from the festivities. The passive aggressive part of me hopes those girls got in big trouble with their parents and are grounded for the rest of the summer. I know the mom who called me felt terrible(she's a very nice person), so it's a sure bet that she mentioned the slighting to her daughter.
Okay, I accidentally left my cell phone on my desk when I ran out for some lunch. 4 missed calls from home when I got back. Seems some guy's dogs had gotten out and when he rounded them up in front of our house, he began beating them with a whip and pounding their heads against his truck. What is it with people?! My kids are very upset. They got the license plate and a description and said one of the neighbors came out and talked to the guy, but as soon as he went back in his house the man hit the dogs again! I'm going to go home and talk with the neighbor to get the scoop and decide from there whether to call the police or not. Hopefully the neighbor did it. I'm surprised my son didn't go jump the guy.
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