Mall Madness

A combination of hyper children, need for socialization and torrential downpours led me to mall today. Not the mall near my house, where it's usually me and a thousand people speaking Spanish and old abuelas sharing their Vallarta Cheesey Puffs. It was at the mall near my mother. The pretty one, where the nanny / child percentage tops most peoples' credit card APR. Where there's a fancy children's boutique outside the play area, beckoning you to spend money you don't have on overpriced baby blankets that your child is just going to vomit on. The one with the fancy furniture stores where I can feel guilty for having mismatched desks in my office when for $6000 Rex and I can have complimenting mission style ensembles. But let's face it, it's our mission style ways that led us to our two children, which led us to eating cheap Mission burritos on Taco Tuesdays, which made us spend less on our style in the first place, so the hell with that furniture. I'll get my Pottery Barn office... it's just going to be in bits and pieces. Like most of my dishes - thanks to my children. Which just validates me even more for not spending 6 grand on an office set.

My point? Lots of DKNY babies, Calvin Klein mommies, screenwriting Daddy O's on lap tops and Petunia Picklebottom toting nannies casing the joint. Enter a rain dripped Sophie, Dominic in mismatched socks, and a hunkering Mama P in her pony tailed finest.

Quick side note: To give myself credit, I have a Petunia Picklebottom diaper bag also. My mommy friend, L, has one also. (L is fabulous... I joke that she's just like me, only 100 pounds thinner... From now on, I will refer to her as Mama P Light) I didn't spend the money on these threads to have the label - I just love the bag, and I'm worth it. So is L. And maybe most of these moms are boring sheep like me who all like the funky but oh so exclusive line of Chinese silk baby bags. Good for them. Good for me. I'm not here to make a judgement call on our individual tastes, or lack of. Why be critical when it's so much more fun making up stories about them in my head? ("Oooh, that mom could be snarling because she really isn't as rich as she looks, but instead gets her clothes by shop lifting because she's pissed at her abusive Arab and she's biding time before she leaves him for the pool cleaner"... You know, those normal kind of thoughts).

I try so hard to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. Especially moms, because I know what it's like to have great kids go loco on you, or unexpected illnesses, or just plain rotten days when even the dog talks back at you. I know.

Which is why I was so upset when this woman turned to me near the slide and said, "Your son had an accident. You need to to change him."

It's true. Scooby Doo had sprouted a leak. I had just noticed it myself and was planning on leaving seconds before she accosted me, which is why I told her as uninterested as possible,"I don't care. It's just pee. I'll get to it when I can."

Which is when I turned back to my mother, who had arrived moments earlier, and watched as she took this mechanical grinch out of a giant Xmas bag and pressed to button, causing it to gyrate in green glory.

So there I was... the tacky mother who had a mismatched child with pee on him, Sophie with a birds' nest hair do, and my mother making a green Xmas monster do the Margarena.

Eventually I turned around and left, but not without turning to Miss Nosy Mommy and saying "You know what, I know my son is wet, but mind your own business." At which she said "It's my business to keep the play area safe for other kids who don't need your kids' pee on the slide".

Which, she was right, but fxxx her. At which my mother, Grinch in toe, said to her "Watch it!" and took off.

I hate judgemental mothers. And I love my mother.

And any mother out there reading this... if you see a mom with bad hair and a wet kid, let's trust that she knows he needs a clothing change. If you can't be nice, don't say anything at all. Or at least ask what size cappucino she wants.