It seems that I blog about once a year (around my oldest son's birthday) so naturally when something happened around his birthday this year that I thought, I should go blog....I also thought, man, I'm a broken record. But c'est la vie.
Last year it was birthday party favor bags. What to put in, what to not put in, how much to put in....this year? Birthday parties. My son is in preschool, and for turning the grand age of five, I thought, we could consider having a birthday party this year. The problem? At this age, the good and the bad thing is that if you have an event and invite anyone, you really have to invite everyone. So between kids that go to school five days a week, three days a week and two days a week, that's 36 kids. Hardly the 'one kid per year of age' rule of thumb for kids parties. Birthdays at this age are already a delicate dance. Just like the goodie bags, you don't want to go overboard and make other kids/parents go, heh, my birthday wasn't that huge/look at those assholes showing off, but you don't want to do nothing, because then your own kid wonders what is up. So I tried to be aware of what other parents were doing for their kids. Some did little favor bags, some made cupcakes at school, some did something really simple like a sticker for every kid, and still others did nothing. As always, there was no standard to look to, to fit in but not stand out. And 36 kids? That's a lot of kids. But we still looked into it. Just not fast enough. One day at school, there, in my son's cubby, is an invitation to a birthday party. The day after his birthday. So immediately we scrapped the idea for a party. Don't want to look like we're competing, or trying to detract. When did this get so complicated? And I like the kids who were having the party, their moms are nice, etc., but still, it stung. My first lesson in seizing the day. It was my fault for not planning better.
I don't know how long it lasts, but with my oldest son, it seems like a lot of our interactions include managing his expectations and trying to avoid meltdowns over what he imagines things are going to be like and what things are actually going to be like. And of course, there's the fine line of trying to allow him to dream and hope without totally crushing him. Life will do that later all by itself, I don't have to help. But, being the mom with the bawling kid who really looks too old to be having a fit.....not the greatest thing in the world. If he comes home talking about how they learned about Mardi Gras in school and how they are also going to have a parade, I have to think, did he make that up because he thinks it's going to be fun, or are they actually having a parade? If he made it up, will he cry and freak out when he finds out there is no parade? So I've become the negative reality check in life. It's okay if there's no parade, not a big deal, it's still fun to talk about parades.....So I talked to him, let him know how FUN it was that he got invited to a party. How nice it was to go take a present to other kids, and how they would be opening a lot of presents from a lot of people! YAY! Look at mommy's frozen huge freaky smile and not in her anxiety ridden eyes. And he bought it. He was good. He didn't throw a fit when kids were opening a bunch of gifts the day after his birthday. He was excited to give them his gifts (oh yeah, I was the only mom who brought children that I don't know at all gift certificates instead of toys...apparently I am really that out of touch), and he didn't say anything about his own birthday. Did it help that he went to go see MONSTER TRUCKS on his birthday with Daddy? Probably.
The whole thing made me ponder birthdays in general. My birthday is over the summer, so I almost never ran into this problem, and could decide if I wanted to have a party, or even tell my friends about the day at all. I often didn't have a party, probably because I got burned from my formative years when we lived in rural Utah and everyone was invited to everyone else's birthday parties......except for me. And then there were the people who we invited to my birthday......and they didn't come. So now that we aren't living in a religiously oppressive atmosphere (or at least not as oppressive as rural Utah), I am glad that my son is still at the age of 'include everyone.' I am worried about the future when the herd of children will divide themselves into groups. I want my son to be liked, but I also want him to be kind, and to be himself. Most of all I want him to be happy. And this year, despite everything, that's what his birthday was. And for now, I can't ask for more than that. Or I shouldn't at least.
