Peer Pressure
Can someone tell me when, exactly, peer pressure ends? Because at this point, I have visions of all the old people in the nursing home congregating around me in their wheelchairs and walkers and trying to dissuade me from playing bingo because, well, the bingo caller is tough, or trying to convince me to go to the early seating at meals because that’s when all the “cool” residents eat—and by the way, what exactly is a “cool resident”? Is it one who has all his/her hair and teeth? And what color is that hair? And I could go on and on, but I hope you get my point.
Growing up, I tended to avoid a lot of the kids trying to convince me to do what I didn’t feel was right. Moving between middle school and high school helped; once I got away from the middle school I hated, I just tried to keep a low profile and not make any waves. Apparently, a bunch of us had the same philosophy, because I ended up in a group of really nice boys and girls who didn’t much care about the same things I didn’t care about either.
I thought I’d gotten past it. Then I became a mom and I found out how wrong I was. Because I experienced a whole new form of peer pressure. It wasn’t about buying the right baby clothes or attending the cool kiddie classes. This form of peer pressure seems to be about making people worry and stress over everything.
Now, before I go any further, let me just say this. I am the Queen of Stress. There is NO ONE, and I mean NO ONE who stresses better than I. I stress when I have nothing to stress about because obviously I must have forgotten something to stress about! So I value friends who don’t help me add to that stress.
But I’m not talking about my friends. I’m talking about the acquaintances. You know, the ones I meet in the grocery store (when I’m just running in for 1 or 2 things and my hair is everywhere and I’m wearing clothes that I wouldn’t be caught dead in otherwise), or while waiting for an activity to end, or in the carpool lane.
There must be something in my expression or another blinking light over my head (other than the Sucker Light) that tells these people that I want to hear about how much they hate something that I’m about to do, or how difficult something my child is going to do is. Because they tell it to me EVERY. SINGLE. TIME.
In January of my oldest daughter’s kindergarten year (JANUARY!), moms came up to me and started telling me how hard 1st grade was, and what a huge adjustment it was going to be and how much homework there was and on, and on, and on. I started out by blowing them off—well, I listened politely and then ignored everything they said. Because seriously, how hard can 1st grade be? 1+1 = 2 and “cat,” “sat” and “hat” all rhyme. It’s not like she was going to jump from kindergarten to middle school! But after six months of being barraged by ridiculous people’s ridiculous worries (see my note above on stress—for me to say their worries are ridiculous is obviously saying something), even I started to worry.
As I suspected, it was no big deal.
When my daughter was the only girl on her T-ball team (I know nothing about baseball, I had no clue there was a girls’ team and a boys’ team, and it’s not like the town refused to take my money), all the moms came up to me and suggested I might want to move my daughter to the girls’ T-ball team. Other than the first day, when we showed up and the Princess said, “Mom, I’m the only girl,” she didn’t have any issue with it. All the boys ran up to her, asked her to play catch with them, and sat on the bench and discussed Star Wars with her. And I had an easy time spotting her because she was the only one with a pink batting helmet.
When we started middle school, again, all the experienced moms (not my friends!) came up to me and told me how hard it was, what teams to avoid and what teachers to avoid. I might as well have homeschooled my kids, because I think there might have been two teachers who weren’t trashed.
Both my kids have loved middle school and with few exceptions, have had great teachers—there have been a couple of doozies, but hey, it’s good experience for life.*
Parents have called me to ask if I’m stressed about my daughter’s upcoming test. Um, no, I’m not taking it. Other parents have called asking me if I’d like to set up a study group for my daughter. Really? The goal is to get her to study, and I’m pretty sure if I set up anything resembling a study group, she’d turn around and burn her books. That’s her job, not mine. I stopped setting up “play dates” a long time ago.
Now that we’re heading to high school, it’s more of the same. Your child has to stand out. Your child has to do this or that. Watch out, the teachers in this subject are awful! Everything is so hard! She’ll never get into college!
The best is when we went for orientation and the administration warned us about the block schedule they follow and how they know we’re going to stress about it, but not to worry, our kids will get it eventually. Why would I stress over not understanding my child’s schedule? I’m not the one who has to follow it, she is. If she wants to discuss it with me, or brainstorm ways to remember how it goes or where she has to be when, I’m happy to sit down with her. But she’s pretty smart. She handled that transition from kindergarten to 1st grade pretty well. I’m pretty sure she will be able to figure out her schedule within a couple of hours, if not days. I haven’t run across any kids at this point who don’t know their schedule—it’s February. And if there are any, well, maybe that’s Darwinism at work.
Now if only Darwin could get rid of all my these people who try to make me worry for nothing!
*If I’ve freaked anyone else out, or turned into one of these moms for you, I sincerely apologize. [image error]
