Just Take It

To sum up my childhood on the social spectrum,  I would say I probably fell more on the side of "outsider"than "in crowd." It's not that I didn't fit in exactly. I knew a lot of people, and I liked most of them. I like to think they liked me just as well. People tend to think I'm funny. It's true. I am. However, I wouldn't have been the first to have gotten that phone call offering a sleepover or chance to "ride around" town. While I tend to get along well with most people, something's just missing--that "it" factor. There's a reason no one has ever directed the phrase, "It won't be the same without you" towards me, and I still work to try to uncover the truth behind this.

Whether this truth bothered me or not came in waves. Sometimes, I desperately wanted someone to reach out to me and beg to have me in his/her presence even if just for an afternoon. Other times, I relished in the solitude. Being lonely wasn't all bad, if even at all. As a child, I read a lot, made lots of artsy/crafty things, spent time with my parents, and created stories with my Barbies in how I believed adults really lived (boy, was that a disappointment when the reality of adulthood hit me--what do you mean I can't arrive in a Corvette to my teaching/dolphin training job, while sailing around the world in my yacht donning evening gowns every day?). Surprisingly, I ended up having a highly creative mind and a keen understanding of the human condition as a result.

Sometimes, I think my social life was really an extension of my sister's (look up "social butterfly" in a thesaurus, and a synonym for the term reads "Amanda Bess Wahl Decker"). The only reason I even know that people say, "But it won't be the same without you there" is because Amanda attracts quite a following of devoted fans, and if she can't make it to something, the party may as well get cancelled. Oftentimes, she let me come with her to her various engagements. It was always fun because Amanda is quite a character herself. She offers endless laughs and entertainment to all she meets. However, coming home after nights of laughter and activity with her friends (who, both high school and college friends, had generously adopted me as one of their own), I always felt that flood of relief when the headlights of her little maroon Saturn shined onto our house showing that we were finally home.

As I grew older, I really relished in being alone. Amanda had moved away and started a family of her own, so I didn't have her to channel a social life through any more. The only people I really ever cared to do anything with outside of working were Jeffrey and my two friends, Marie and Sarah. It was a good life, certainly, and I would call myself happy even today except now I believe I am seeing my child pay the price for my introverted personality.

Jude has gone to the same school since Pre-K. Since then, he has been invited to countless birthday parties but has only been invited to exactly one play date. I haven't yet returned the favor of having the little boy over to our house because of all the naps and needs of my younger kids. I like the family a lot, and Jude thinks their son is the greatest kid to have walked the Earth. He is pretty adorable, and they do play well together.

However, I'm starting to see that somewhat introverted personality of Jude's. He's like me in that he likes the kids in his grade a lot, but he only really likes that one friend. I've noticed through pictures on Facebook that various kids often get together for play dates, movies, etc.;the groups of kids are never the same. They mix and mingle. One kid may be posing with two other kids from the grade and two days later, he's in a picture a whole different group of kids from the grade. They always look like they're having a blast, and their mothers look like they're enjoying themselves as well.

I don't know how to get Jude more involved with the kids in his class. Sure, we do the Scouts and sports and after school programs, but I'm talking about good ol' hanging out. I never hear about anyone meeting up for a play date until I've seen it's already happened. One time, I even put myself out there and said, "Awe, we would have loved to have done that" to which one of the mothers said, "Next time, we'll definitely let you know." It turns out that there was a next time, but I didn't know.

Now, I don't believe for a second that Jude is being left out on purpose. As far as I can tell, people like him just fine. All of his teachers have always told me that he's well-liked by all of his classmates. However, I think he's like me and just nobody notices him. I don't think he's bothered by it right now because I don't think he's aware. However, if the course of his life takes as similar a direction as mine, it will bother him sometimes, and during his childhood, it may end up bothering him more than not.

Yesterday, I took Jude to a joint birthday party for two kids in his grade. We showed up a little late, and I was a tad frazzled because I rushed down to Madison from work to pick Jude up and get him to the party. The night before, Jude had reminded me that we needed to still get birthday presents, and since Jeffrey was working late, I loaded up all three kids in the van and headed to Wal-Mart. Jude deliberated over the gifts for several minutes while I proceeded to bark orders for him to hurry up so we could go home, get supper ready, and eat. He carefully picked out two Nerf guns but different ones because as he said, "They're not the same person." He then took the time to decide which gun better suited which kid. All the while, I thought to myself, "It doesn't matter. Now, I'm hungry. Let's go!"

I realized when I took Jude in for the party that I had not yet wrapped the gifts nor brought them in. I was going to leave to find wrapping paper, but the parents all insisted I stay. It's a good thing they did, too, because minutes into the party, Jude had fallen funny on his ankle. He's fine; I think the fall more embarrassed and scared him than hurt him. Both of the mothers were very attentive and kind to him, too, and for the rest of the party, he thoroughly enjoyed himself.

As we got ready to leave, I saw the pile of presents and remembered I still needed to bring in the gifts I had left in the car. I told one of the mothers that I was sorry I hadn't yet wrapped them but that I was going out to get them really quickly. She told me not to worry about it. She also told me they didn't want the gifts and to save them for the next child who has a party. I kind of pushed it a little bit, because after all, what do I want with two Nerf guns when we've already got a' plenty? However, she insisted. I knew she meant that she didn't want one more gift, and I totally understood. I also knew that she didn't want me to feel bad for having forgotten to wrap the gifts. For a mother, it's one less toy to clutter the house, and it's one less thank you note to have to fight your child to write. I'd have likely done the same thing had I been in her position. I completely get it.

Except that I don't. I don't because when we walked out of the door, I saw that scene play out through my child's perspective. As soon as we walked out of the door, Jude asked me why they didn't want his presents. When I turned to answer him, tears had already welled up in his eyes and his bottom lip had started quivering. What were just silly Nerf guns to most (myself included) were gifts carefully chosen by Jude for his two friends. He painstakingly considered the style of gun, color, and even size of the "bullets" and even put up with a great deal of nagging from me while on his quest to get them. It hurt to see him feel so small, and as a result I also felt so small. At that moment, I had a good mind to march those presents into the building and chuck 'em at the whole damn lot of them, but emotional maturity swept in and saved me and Jude both from an embarrassment that neither of us would have ever lived down as long as we had anything to do with parochial education.

Unfortunately, I had no words of wisdom to offer my son. What do you tell a kid in a situation like that? I knew better than to say, "It doesn't matter," so instead I just threw in one of those trite, "I don't know"s followed by an "It's ok." However, what I almost said instead was, "Eventually, you'll get used to it," but I held back.

While I'm obviously upset over the situation, I'm not exactly upset with anybody. One of the mothers told me when we had gotten to the party that she would've been happy to have picked Jude up from school and brought him so I wouldn't have had to rush. I wished that had happened because Jude would have felt so important being picked up by a friend. (Plus, it would have kind of/sort of felt like play date.) Also, the mother thanked us for coming, and I could tell she really meant it.  How would they have known that Jude had picked the presents out himself or even cared enough to do so? I believe if they had known, that scene would have played out much differently, and because of that, I could never be mad at anyone.

However, as someone who contemplates absolutely everything, I can't help but wonder why this happened. Here are multiple families who more or less teach their children the same Christian values, and still someone gets slighted. The unintentional hurts feel pretty bad (although, seeing your child hurt feels the worst). I wonder if the families would have wanted to know that they inadvertently hurt Jude by turning down his gifts. I'm about 99.9% sure that had it been me someone had confronted, I'd immediately have gone on the defensive and would not have handled something like that well. I'm just a ray of sunshine like that. Because it's not something a little writing therapy won't help me get over, I'm not going to tell them. Hell, we have enough trouble figuring out how to "break in" to these social circles. It's not Jude's fault his mother's a social retard. Maybe one of them will read about it, and maybe it would make them uncomfortable, but hopefully if they get through the whole post, they'll realize we still really like them and had the tables turned, we'd have likely done the same thing without realizing how the child would have felt.

Jude did not withstand any sustainable emotional damage that day. In fact, by the time we met up with Jeffrey, he was pretty much convinced it was the best birthday party ever.  The kid's resilient that way, and he didn't get that from me.

As for the spare Nerf guns--Jude has another birthday party coming up--a little girl's. I texted her mother last night to find out if the girl was into Nerf guns as a joke. It turns out that she would totally love one!  However, Jude may still insist on going to Wal-Mart to find her the "right" gift.