It wasn't :
*the 20 yards of sand tracked in from the sandbox
*the state of the kitchen and bathroom sinks (and floors,walls and towels) after millions of killer water balloons were manufactured
*the nerve of those who dared to utter those two EVIL words (I"M BORED)
*the diaper explosion that warranted a heavy duty gas mask
*the requests for clean, dry towels after exactly two minutes of pool use
*the amount of bird seed that was eaten by toddlers before our feeder craft was completed
*the tattling, the pettiness, or the volume
.....of the children that was my undoing.
It was mean-spiritedness that did me in this morning. Kids excluding others. Kids teasing in that awful sing song way. Kids racing to be first- which can only mean that someone else will come last, or not at all.
I know what it feels like to have that ugly meanness inside but it seems particularily cruel and painful that children come to this entirely on their own.
4 comments:
I have started to see some of this in my children...and it baffles me, terrifies me and saddens me...all at once.
me too.
it makes me sad.
i once chased down a boy that was teasing another boy (about 3 years younger then me when i was in grade 9) and made the mean boy say sorry.
...actually come to think of it....i also did that last year on my way to work.
Hey, Joyce, thanks for coming over by the way! I see this too in mine and the one I babysit. It's really mind-wrenching to see how instinctively selfish and oppositional humans are from even such a young age. It's one of our most important duties as parents and child-care givers to teach selflessness, and more importantly--to live it.
This may be the minority opinion, but I see it as less of an inherent cruelty, and more as children exploring different mindsets and behaviors, figuring out which ones get the world to be how they want it to be. And yes, it's selfish. But in kids, I think that's probably some kind of survival trait. They can't provide for themselves, so they have to be selfish and demanding in order to get what they need/want.
This is just coming to me, and I haven't thought it through, so I'm sorry if this doesn't make sense. But I just wanted to put a different spin on it and see what people think.
Thanks for finding my site so I could find yours. :)
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