A Stranger’s Reaction

Last night, we decided to go to Barnes and Noble. George wanted to pick out some guitar learning books, so he took the baby in the stroller and I headed over to the kids section with the two other boys.

They read through some books, played with the Thomas the train table, and looked at some stuffed animals. Then we all went over to the in-store coffee shop (if you want to call it that) and ordered some hot chocolate and chocolate cheesecake. The boys drank their treat and had a couple of bites of the cheesecake and then we headed back over to the music book section.

There was a young man (maybe in his late teens early twenties?) and he was reading “Twilight.” The boys were starting to get restless and were talking to me (mind you, they were talking in a normal voice not yelling or screaming). The young man looked up at me and then the kids and then shook his head in disapproval.

This was a different reaction than the one we had at the outlets last weekend. It was in the evening and the boys were TIRED and had just finished eating. In this situation, they were running around and squealing with laughter and making LOTS of noise. I was feeling very frustrated because I felt like I could not control my kids. A young woman walked up to us and said that our kids were cute. What? They act up and people think it’s cute? They talk a little and people are annoyed? You never know what kind of reaction you’ll get from a stranger.

P.S. I used to be one of those people that would get annoyed at the parents when their kids were really noisy or acted up in the store. Now I feel empathy for them. Oh how times have changed – lol 🙂