idle nannies

A nannie sits at the side of the playground chatting with her friend. The adorable child says 'hello' as i walk past, and begins to follow me to the tennis court. She's being friendly and curious. The nanny jumps up and runs after her shouting "No!!!!" in a frightened and fearful tone.

If she'd been paying attention it could have been pleasant and wonderful. That child is now slightly more stressed around strangers and will likely grow up to stay contained. I wish her luck and an impulse to grow and explore in later years when she is offered freedom.

assert yo'self, momma!

A 3 year old boy becomes fascinated with me and we begin playing together. He is shooting imaginary beams out of his openfaced hands, and i am pretending to be loaded up with energy and occasionally blasted away. I shoot him back with imaginary beams out of my open hands. It begins to drizzle/mist very lightly, not enough to get wet. The mother follows us around for 15 minutes telling him how its raining and she wants to go in a tone of voice that sounds like a child whining. She is weak. He ignores her. When she finally asserts herself, he is leaving and I say goodbye, but he complains that he wants to stay. she gives him five more minutes and sets a timer (which had been going off over and over again previously and she would say "see? the timer is going off! We need to go!" but never followed through) We continue to play. Finally, I have to leave because my son is ready for his nap and they probably leave soon after.

unfairness in adult power

Two pre-school boys are fighting over a plastic phone that belongs to one of them. The nanny comes over after the owner of the toy wins in a scuffle saying "can i have the phone?" The boy sulks and gives it to her. The boy who had been fighting for the toy (but had lost) reaches out his hand to receive the phone. The nanny, not knowing the boy very well, gives it to him. The original owner/winner sees this and skulks away.

Poor kid. Kids work out their scuffles amongst themselves. An adult exercising authority feels totally disempowering and unfair.

unreasonable, unflexible, unkind

At the Clemejentri playground in falls church, virginia: A boy had (i gathered) commented that he was cold. His monster mother gave him a choice between wearing his little sisters pink fluffy jacket or her oversized sweater. He pouted and said he didn't want to wear a sweater and was fine and wanted to go play. She demanded for the next 5 minutes that he choose a sweater. His slightly older brother was watching, wanting to go play, but not allowed to do so. The mother said "If you don't wear one of these jackets we're going to go to the car and even if you change your mind we won't come back! She started moving towards the car. Nobody was happy. I was staring, fixated on what was going on, feeling sorry for the powerless boy forced to make a decision between two unsatisfactory choices. I bet he was wishing he'd never mentioned how cold he was.

Eventually the older brother gave his younger brother his vest, and his mother demanded he choose between the sweaters, and he was wearing his mothers oversized sweater that went to his knees and whose sleeves were way too long for him. It looked ridiculous and he couldn't really move in it, so the mother eventually allowed him to take it off.

It was mild and sunny.

She was sooo unreasonable!!!