My coadvisor, S, (who is 5 months preggers with her second son!!!) brought her first son with her. J is about 2.5 years old. He's energetic but ADORABLE. Anyway, we went upstairs to where the ceremony was taking place. A bunch of chairs were set up for the teens to sit in and perpendicular to those chairs were chairs for the guests. S and I sat down in the spectator area but J was not in the mood to sit.
Off to the side was a pool table. S sat J on the edge of the table, holding on to him, and gave him one of the pool balls. He started rolling it into the pocket and would giggle when he made it in. Now there were other balls in the pocket so it did make a small noise when it went in. But we are talking about a ceremony being led by teenagers and attended by teenagers. Believe me when I say J's noise was barely noticeable.
But a woman in the spectator area actually shushed us (well ... technically S and J but I was standing there so I'll say us). S fortunately realized she wasn't doing anything wrong and decided to ignore the woman (who was now also rolling her eyes).
I happen to know this woman. I know that her youngest child is an advanced teenager. So it has been a LONG time since she's had a toddler.
Do mother's forget?
Is it possible she has forgotten what it was like to calm her children? I know one of her girls very well. While lovely and creative, quiet she is not. I imagine she gave her mother quite a challenge when growing up. And I'm positive if that mother had been shushed she would have spoken up in her defense.
Shouldn't all mothers support each other (too naive?). I'm not even a mother yet but I recognized that this wasn't an "inappropriate" place for a kid and J was definitely not doing anything wrong.
What about motherhood support? Instead of looking at S with J and flashing the "knowing" mommy smile, she decided to shush and roll her eyes.
Am I the only one who thinks there is something wrong here? That this woman broke some sort of mommy code?
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| A picture of my mom just because! |
