ball and chain..
Or is it trying to love two women.. old country song in my head sorry and before anyone has heart failure there is nothing wrong with me and the Waterman. We are fine, wonderful to be exact. This is about my youngest child, before your next heart failure he doesn't have lovers or women. What he has is two friends that are tearing him apart!
Why can't kids these days realize that it is OK to have more than one friend? Why can't they understand that it is ok to hang out with people from other cliques? When I was in high school, that was the odd thing about me I suppose, there wasn't a group I couldn't hang with. I thought it was because I was too weird to belong to any one group at the time but looking back on that time of my life there wasn't any groups that really shunned me. I was just strange enough that everyone wanted me in so they could try to figure me out I suppose. Well that and I knew where to get all the "illegals". I was what I like to call a "Clique Hopper" and later in life that helped when I started bar hopping! The role of "Clique Hopper" was never understood by this person. Which is totally crazy because SHE was a "Clique Hopper" too. I suppose what freaked her out was I would hop into cliques that were dangerous territory for her. They were probably dangerous for everyone there and I am quite sure that I left more than a few brain cells around those cliques, but it was high school you are supposed to do that right?
Anyway my point here is that the little dude has a new friend and he has no idea how to divide his time. Don't get me wrong I LOVE the fact that he has friends. When we moved here he had no one and spent countless hours in his room playing video games. Then he met Friend 1 who lived right across the road. They were inseparable it was great my little guy had a friend who I wasn't friends with his parents first!! Awesome right? Wrong. We moved. Only a mile down the road but to an 8 year old that may as well be across the state. Just this month I have agreed to let him walk the mile to see Friend 1 but the issue is in the mean time he has met Friend 2 and if Friend 2 is around he completely doesn't want to hang with Friend 1. Which really isn't all that big a deal because Friend 2 is so much closer to home and I have known Friend 2's parents all my life. Well this weekend enter Friend 3. This is new.. Friend 3.. I had never even heard of him before until Friday and all of a sudden I get told "Friend 3 wants me to come over today and play". Friend 3's parents I do not know, I do not know where they live, or their phone number. I know nothing about Friend 3 except his name is Friend 3. So finally today after many phone calls that were answered with Dude is not here right now (Friend 3 apparently knows how to use the phone and is not afraid to use it) I met the parents of Friend 3, they seemed nice enough so I allowed Dude to hang out there for the afternoon and he apparently had a great time. And as soon as he got home he headed up to see Friend 2, but over dinner I get the bomb shell of all friend bomb shells... Ma, I am not friends with Friend 1 anymore because Friend 3 doesn't like him. UMM WHAT!!! No No No NO! It does NOT work that way. Friend 1 was your friend before Friend 3. And when I caught myself saying that I knew that was wrong too. I didn't know what to say except but .. please don't be one of THOSE kids.
We talked about it a bit and I hope I made my 9 year old understand that life isn't about being friends with one person, or in one particular group or the other.. I can honestly say that friends help mold me into the person I have become and I feel like if you limit yourself to one person or group you are going to be led to disappointment at some point in life as you are going to get into situations where you do not fit in so well.
It is all funny in a way because I was trying to put some kind of label on my blog the other day.. is it a parenting blog, a marriage blog, a photo blog.. that kind of thing.. my blog like me does not belong to any particular group and I like it that way! I just hope I can raise my kids to be the same.
Father’s Day 2023
1 year ago
6 comments:
I have a daughter and I can remember those days well. She had 2 good friends and they could get along most of the time and then one would not like the other and not want the other to be friends with the other....you get the picture. My son didn't seem to have that problem as much as the girls but in the end everyone seems to get along well with everyone else. I guess they do eventually grow out of it.
Funny coming here and reading this after my evening & listening to my daughter complain about her best friend ditching her for the boyfriend, her other friends going out & not inviting her along. Being a parent is always a challenge it seems, no matter how old they get.
By the way, don't worry about labeling your blog. Some of us just aren't meant to be labeled!
I've tried to go and look at your other blog but it won't let me in for some reason. Oh well! I feel like I've been left out of the cool clique at school! Wahh....anyways, I think you are a wonderful mother. I tried to teach my kids that they didn't "have" to belong to any one group, that it was important they stood out as an individual and didn't need to pigeonhole themselves to fit anyone else's mold about who they should or should not be. They only needed to be themselves. So far they all seem pretty well adjusted! I did the trying to fit in thing when I was a teen and I probably left a few brain cells where I shouldn't have too!! I wanted more than that for my kids.
Ahhh...high five! I was also one who did not stick with one clique in high school; I hung with whoever was around, and it is one thing that I know I did right back then. And I also must say this--I started 7th grade in 1968 and graduated from high school in 1974; small town, combined Grades 7-12 Jr./Sr. High School. The emphasis in those years was "being yourself" rather than following the crowd and I feel really fortunate to have grown up during those years. It wasn't quite as judgmental as it's seemed to me during other times. I feel really sorry for kids now; there just seems to be so much more to deal with! But, to this day, I am not a "join the crowd" type of person; I've always just liked who I like--and I like you! 9-3/4ths times out of 10, I read what you write and think "Yeah, I know!" And I'm noticing that we all seem to like the same people. Oh no! Are we forming a blog clique? HAHAHAHA! All I know is this, I can't imagine life without my blog friends; I feel truly blessed. And ya know what? Little dude is going to get the whole friendship thing figured out just fine; just look at his Mama! He must be feeling a little friend-overwhelmed right now, though, he went from 1 to 3 and it can get overwhelming :)! He won't be "one of those kids"--I just know it!
And why do I always write you a novel? Sorry for being a comment-page hog. Not really, though. :)
Sometimes I don't think you know me at all. There were some people you hung out with that I simply did not like. It had nothing to do with anything but that. It's one thing to not be part of a clique another to simply not want to hang with people because they were yucky, gross and just plain annoying. I am stunned that you said I couldn't understand being a Clique Hopper. I'm the one that got in trouble in fourth grade and was always aware of cliques. I had to go look up the word in the dictionary! GRRRRRR, you'd be dateless in this episode of As The Car Rolls. No hay for you!
Honey... It kills me he's NINE!!! It's such a tough thing 'friends' at that age... I know you will get through this fine and he will too. He's always been a smart kid and will do the right thing for him in the end. I know you hate it when 'friend 3' tries to push our sweet Dude's around but he'll be fine. I miss you so much ya ya!! Love you!
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