When you are in public with your children, you are going to have to deal with the old lady factor. And by old lady I mean “old enough to be a grandmother” so, like, 40 and up these days. But the old lady factor has nothing to do with your age, and all to do with how you act towards cute children that you see roaming stores and sidewalks.
Young ladies (mother age) smile and maybe give a knowing look at the parents, as if to say “Yup. That’s how kids are.” Old ladies stop and talk to the children, or you, and this is also fine. They are generally pleasant enough and only want to compliment your kids or give them advice and stuff. You have to deal with that. You know that, and you have to be okay with it. But then sometimes you get the weirdos.
On Friday I was in a store with my wife and son. My wife was paying downstairs at the register while I tried to corral Edward toward her general direction. As we came down the stairs we were hit with the old lady factor. “Oh, how cute!” she exclaimed, and crouched down to talk to my son. “You’re doing a great job! Yes, you are! You’re a big boy!” she informed him, apparently referring to his stair descending prowess. As this was not news to him, and since she was a stranger after all, he grunted something loudly at her and ran off past her looking for his mother. This left the woman to smile broadly and coo and cluck to herself.
Now, if that was where the story ended, I would not be writing about it. That is pretty normal actually, but it didn’t stop after that encounter. No, a minute or so later, after my wife had paid and we were getting on our mittens and other assorted paraphernalia, the woman appeared again. Edward was in my wife’s arms and I was trying to jam a mitten onto his hand when she suddenly apparated beside us and stuck her long finger out into my son’s face.
“I just HAVE to get a look at that face again.” she informed us, jabbing her finger at him as he turned away and hid his face.
“Oh, he’s being shy today,” my wife said politely as I continued to try to get that mitten on (a task made much more difficult now that he was hiding from a stalker).
“But I HAVE to see that cute little face. Where is that face? Let me see that face?” she cooed. And she would not stop grinning and prodding.
Edward finally looked up, saw the finger inches away from his face, growled, and smacked her hand away, once again burying his face in my wife’s jacket. But even this did not deter her. She continued to poke and prod him, even as we apologized for our son’s shy behavior. How rude of him to not want to be jabbed in the face by a weird old lady that he didn’t know.
Finally, we just started walking away as the woman called things out to us as we left the store. Mitten accomplished, we could not wait to get out of there. We all agreed that Edward was well within his rights to smack that lady’s hand away, and in fact he probably ought to have put her in a full nelson and body slammed her onto the floor.
Does any of that story sound appropriate to you? I get that people are going to smile and coo at my kids, due to their extreme cuteness and general awesomnicity, but I think that crossed a line. What do you think?
I find it useful to say,
“I’m sorry ma’m, but we teach our son/daughter that he is in charge of his body, and to keep good personal space with strangers. You may be a lovely person, but our rule doesn’t change just because the stranger makes nice cute noises. In fact, most really bad people precede their harmful behavior with cute coo’ing noises and praise. So thank you for giving our family our privacy and helping us raise him to have good boundaries.”
Alternatively, or if she doesn’t listen,
“Back off. You are a stranger and I do not want you in my son’s face.”
Alternatively, you could always try cooing at and poking the old lady in the face. I call that “Interactive Reverse Psychology.”