Proud and Boastful are NOT the Same Thing

One of greatest challenges of being a mother is competition. Parents competing for whose child is smarter, more social, more agile, or even more of a challenge. This competition can come from friends but it can also come from absolute strangers.

For one of our weekend adventures, our family decide to visit a different branch of the Durham Public Libraries. We typically visit the main branch as it is both the closest and the best stocked. I mean this place has three stories of books. We love it. However, we have checked out the entire collection of board books from there at least twice over. We need a new supply. That's how we found ourselves over at the newest branch just off of Highway 98.

Walking in was just like a dream. The doors opened automatically; everything was so shiny and fresh; and they had lots of not yet masticated board books. It was perfect.

Perfect that is until another parent came over to browse. She plopped her daughter, who appeared to be of similar age to Linus, down on the floor and they started browsing books. I couldn't help but admire her for helping her daughter take an early interest in reading. The first grade teacher in me wanted to beam at them.

Browsing through the books, I couldn't help but overhear their conversation as it seemed to be, if not directed at me, than intended for me. It was a conversation that was a bit louder than needed for just the pair, and obviously meant to be overheard. It went something like this:

Mom: "Honey, what's this a picture of?"
The toddler girl replied with some form of toddler babble that seemed unintelligible to me, however I'm sure her mother understood her.
Mom: "You're right that's a ball. What's this a picture of?"
Again the little girl responded with some babble.
Mom: "Oh sweetie, you want to tell me in French, ok."

At this moment I think to myself, 'Wow! Lucky her to be growing up bilingual."

The mother than continues with her little girl going back and forth like this. I'm still unable to actually comprehend any of what the toddler is saying, maybe she was actually giving German a whirl today.

After a bit, Linus who was over playing puzzles with his daddy approaches. He addresses me in his usual, "Dah-boom," which I know refers to me but wouldn't expect anyone else to. Linus then points to a book or something on a book and issues his usual, "Dat."

The mother then directly addresses me, "Is that his word for book?" To which Adrian, having just walked up responds, "No, that's his word for everything."

The mother looks a bit taken back. Linus wanders off again but the little girl wants to follow him. Her mother tells her to be careful because, "...he's a bit younger than you." She turns to me and asks, "How old is he?"

I inform her that he is 20 months old and she again looks aghast. She tells me, "Oh, I thought he was younger. She's only 17 months old."

Now, I know that nothing has been explicitly said at this point in time. All of this competitive feeling is simply a feeling. My own insecurities could be taking hold so I remind myself that I could be misconstruing all of this and that it is not meant to be anything of a competitive parenting nature.

However, all my positive thoughts vanish a few minutes later when the little girl selects a book off the shelf to read. Her mother glances at it, takes it from her daughter, and places it back on the shelf saying, "Oh honey, that book is too easy. You already know all those words."

I'll admit, I may be overreacting a bit. I may be a touch defensive of my son's slow to develop verbal language skills. However, this just felt a bit too braggy for my tastes. What do you think?

I know part of being a parent is the strong desire to shout from the rooftops every little development or growth our children make. (I have a blog about my son for goodness sakes.) However, maybe we all just need to remember to do our shouting from our own rooftops and maybe the grandparents' rooftops because you never know whose challenges you might just be digging at.