All three of my boys are having sleepovers tonight. Sasquatch is somewhere else and the other two (and their friends) are here. I have to confess that I'm really ungodly tired of sleepovers. They're like a twelve hour long fight/bitch session/"I'm telling"/"why is my friend hanging out with him?"/"he knows I hate that game"/blah/ blah/ blah.
Somehow the message has been planted that a weekend without some sort of a sleepover isn't much of a weekend. (Something tells me that if I showed up with my own "sleepover friend", my kids wouldn't think it was necessary in the least. But I digress).
Gumby's friend is one who has been here many times and we all know well. Surfer Dude's friend, on the other hand, isn't. They've been in class together for a year, but haven't really socialized much before now. I couldn't pick the parents out of a line-up, and if they know me I'm not aware of it. And yet they let him come over and spend the night without any kind of parental connection being made. I kept waiting for them to call and give me the third degree - which I most certainly would have done, just as soon as I finished calling all the other parents I knew for references.
But no. When I got home from work they had all just gotten here. When I picked up my phone messages, there was a message from the new kid's mom saying that he had been supposed to call her when he got here and she wasn't even sure she had the right number. I called her back and said he was here, and was she sure she was okay with this and did she want to talk to him? And she just said oh, no, that's fine...and hung up.
Am I hopelessly anal retentive, or is this just not right?
Saturday, August 30, 2008
sleepover central
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13 comments:
Maybe she knows you better than you think. Have fun!!!
sounds like she just wanted him out of her hair. stinky and i always check w parents, we meet them, etc. i like to know who my kids are going to be around.
and as for her not wanting to talk to him? come on! kinda sad, really.
I don't think it's weird or sad that she didn't want to talk to him. All she wanted was to know he'd arrived safely, which your phone call accomplished. (And he might be one of those independent-types who would be sullen on the phone if he was being checked up on and she'd want to avoid that.)
But I do think it's odd that she didn't find out more about you. My mom would have, that's for sure.
And I think it's especially odd that she hung up on you. Maybe social skills are not her strong suit.
There is a wide range of parenting skills out there. I'll be knowing the parents before I leave them in charge of my boys. But that is me.
The sleepover should help you learn about the new boy better. I hope you get a little quiet this weekend.
I don't have kids so I've got no experience either way, but this seems a little unusual to me.
To me that isn't right at all. But then, I guess you would call me old fashioned.
No, it isn't right. She should at least know you'd planned to be there and a bit about you. I once took my daughter's friend to Las Vegas with us for a week. Her parents were there at the same time. They never once called to see how she was and though this kid was 14, she was hurt by that. People are strange.
It's about as right as the complete stranger who sent her five year old to eat with my sister in a pub while she sat outside with her boyfriend for the next hour.
maybe she's a lurker on your blog and she already knows everything she needs to know about you.
She might have thought that he would have been embarrassed by being asked to talk to him on the phone (very uncool to have your mom check up on you), but yes, I think it's odd not to have any contact at all - either with him or with you. And not even to be sure she had your number.
People have different levels of comfort with these things, but mine is nearer yours than hers. And no, I don't think that's retentive.
Laurie's funny.
No, that's just not right. The third degree is definitely in order if she doesn't know you, from my point of view.
My kids love sleepovers. I, unlike most parents in my area, need to know a hell of a lot about the home environment they are going to, including the grandmothers maiden name. I know you think you are anal, but I have the Megans law website in my list of favorites.
Hopefully my kids will grow up undamaged... by their mothers neurotic behavior. Is there a DSM diagnosis for parents like me..?
Perhaps she thought you were supposed to check on them. With her child in your house she might think you might want to have known more about the boy before letting him sleep over.
But then - without kids - and never having done this - I think sleepovers are just weird. I can see going for a campout - but a sleepover? Where do the visitors sleep?
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