Week 37 Day 3

   I’m on break for Christmas and I decided to take advantage of some of this free time to have lunch with my beautiful wife. 

   I picked her up, we got to the restaurant and everything seemed quite pleasant until the woman at the table across from us started snapping at her daughter.  This continued every couple of minutes until they left which wasn’t soon enough for me to thoroughly enjoy my lunch.

   The parental behavior was appalling and I was trying hard to hide it.  The mother (I estimated in her early 20s) was there for apparently the sole purpose of having her friend (slightly younger) apply different shades of eyeshadow.  (Sorry, honey.  It didn’t help)  So while the mother and her friend were busy playing make-up, the daughter (about 5 years old I think) was very bored.  No surprise there.  So in an effort to entertain herself, the daughter started squirming, wriggling and staggering anywhere in an 8’ diameter.  Anytime the little girl moved too far out in the aisle, her mother snapped at her.  Any time the little girl ended up on the floor, the mother snapped at her.  But the best part was when the girl was leaning up against the railing at which point the mother jumped up and gave her a swat on the butt and continued to… ahem “discipline” the poor girl.

   Yes.  I was being judgemental.  But come on, lady!  Is it really so hard to realize that your daughter is attention starved and maybe if you just engaged her in conversation she wouldn’t be so prone to seeking attention elsewhere?  And I don’t mean conversation like “Wait until grandma gets here and she will see how bad you are being!”  I may be paraphrasing a bit, but yes… she said this to her 5 year-old.  But really, is it grandma’s job to raise your child?

   I imagine this young mother is only attempting to raise her child the way she was raised.  But I hope this little girl can grow up to break the cycle of being an ass.