This Seat's Taken

As an adult, I would like to think that I’ve put aside my childish ways and have become more responsible, more adaptable and less snobbish.  I’ve even listed in several surveys on Facebook that my two biggest pet peeves are snobbishness and bigotry.  So when I am put in situations which bring out the snob in me I feel like a complete and utter hypocrite.  If you’ve ever been to the indoor play area at the mall, you will understand that what I’m about to admit to you is true.  There tends to be convergences of the most extreme forms of mothers at these play areas.  You can spot it at your local playground too, but something about the mall tends to bring out parents from every walk of life.  Maybe it’s because moms are already out shopping, or maybe because the mall is close by and since cold weather has come it’s one of the only free things to do indoors.  But sometimes when I take my son to these places it’s not difficult to figure out there are as many social groups here as the inside of a high school cafeteria.  

While mothers come in all shapes and sizes, there are two extreme types that stand out the most to me.  On any given day you can find either one or both of these moms at the mall.  The first and probably most admirable is the “Duggar” mom.  She is breastfeeding a baby while tying another child’s shoe, while disciplining the other one who is jumping on top of yet another one of her children.  She is not here to shop.  She makes her own clothes because she is broke from having so many kids.  She is a force of nature, this mom.  A third arm magically appears out of her sweater to wipe crumbs off her fifth kid’s face.  She is the type of mom who was born and raised to be a mother.  Now I am not being sarcastic when I say I respect this kind of mother more than any of the others.  She knows what her purpose in life is and it is to be a hard core mom.  She will home school her children and sew all of their clothes to stretch the family budget.  She will devote twenty four hours a day to her children and completely neglect herself.  She is capable of actually enjoying pregnancy and once she’s no longer of child bearing age, will miss those pregnancies.  While I admire her tremendously, respect her purpose and her strength, I don’t identify with her one bit.  I was never taught how to be a mom, much less a stay at home mom.  I just looked around at friends and in laws and tried to copy off of their homework.  I can’t make my own laundry detergent and I will never, ever want to.  I don’t want to make my own baby food either.  But I admire those of you who do and make it look like it is second nature, like you have absolutely no insecurities about mothering.  Be proud of yourself.  You are intimidating as heck to someone like me. 

The other extreme mom is the Juicy mom.  She wants to project that she is too cool and too sexy to be anyone's mom.  She wants you to forget that she is a mom, if she's not trying to forget it herself.  She is a fashion plate.  She has a high maintenance fake tan and is rocking Ugg boots outside of her jeans or her matching Juicy Couture sweat suit.  She wants the world to acknowledge that if Nicole Richie can look hot after having a baby then so can she.  She is texting on her Blackberry and iPhone the entire time her child is playing.  She came to the mall to shop and has the bags of trendy clothes to prove it.  Her child looks like he's just stepped out of a Baby Gap catalog.  Now if you are one of these types of moms, I have something to say to you.  Shut up.  Get off the phone and pay attention to your child.  He is sitting on my son’s head and it’s about to get ugly up in here. 

Now I admit my attitude towards those Juicy moms is a bit snobby.  I’m sorry.  I feel like I have no right to judge any mom because on some level, we are all just trying to do the best we can.  But it’s when I think someone isn’t trying that I get a little resentful. 

I know there are many, many more types of mothers out there; East Coast, West Coast, Pacific and Atlantic moms.  These two extremes just stick out the most to me living in the Midwest.  I fall somewhere in the middle, like I imagine most moms do.  Most of my friends and the mommies I know are just trying to survive, like me.  We just want to get out of the house and go to the mall and be around other moms.  Our kids are bouncing off of the walls at home and so we bring them someplace where they can run and climb, and if we’re lucky and not carrying our screaming kids like footballs out to the car by the end of it all, we get to take in a little window shopping.

I have to confess, I experienced great conviction today at the mall when a woman who was missing some teeth asked me where the closest restroom was.  I told her where it was, of course, and pointed her in the right direction and smiled.  I noticed that some of the other moms she was sitting with were missing their teeth too.  I began to make certain assumptions about them, where they lived, where they came from.  Driving back to my nice suburban home, I shamed myself for being such a supreme snob.  I remembered my own upbringing, my anxiety dreams about my teeth falling out and not having time to get them fixed.  I don’t know what this woman went through this year, just like she doesn’t know what I’ve been through.  I don’t know the sacrifices this woman has had to make just to be able to stay home and raise her daughter.  The inner snob in me recedes back to her rightful place of shame.  It’s good to remind yourself that your story isn’t the only one being told right now.  There are others out there, other moms, just getting the hang of all this stuff too.  Some are pros and some are amateurs, like me.  But no matter what they look like, or who they sit next to, you don’t know where they’ve been or what they’ve been through to get here. 

Thank God for young children, our great equalizers, who are completely unaware of the social standards enforced by adults.  Children don’t care what label is on their clothes (unless you teach them to care).  Children don’t care what their parents look like.  Children don’t care if mommy is trendy, toothless, or tired.  They just want us to be there for them.  Just ask my son.  His mama’s butt is huge.  But it comes in handy when he’s running around the living room and he falls on top of me.  It's a soft cushion for him to land on.