I’ve been trying to find ways to let G play with other children more. In school she is a little social butterfly, but the dynamic in school with roles and rules is different than with friends.   And its a step in her social development I think is lacking.     She is very focused on herself, or on the other kids as actors in her little plays.   This is probably every kid her age.   But it seems different when its her 1-on-1 with another person she knows well, at least it is in how she interacts with me and Beckie and Kila and Alana where its all more give-and-take.

I was initially soured on the whole experience of friends cause of our new neighbors.   Their kid is kinda bratty,their dad is kinda chatty, their mom wants us to be bff.   They kinda sensed my feelings despite my trying to be nice, and suddenly their daughter is not available.   Probably for the best, when that’s how they roll; i hate fake friends.   But I feel responsible that G’s lost a (sometimes)(slightly mean)(high maintenance)(play) mate.

At the park or the zoo now,   I encourage her to play, and I shmooze with the other kids and parents if it helps.   Single serving play-niceings are much easier for me than repeated play-niceings, and are certainly no more effort than riding the rodeo bull that is Genevieve for an hour.     But I’ve also started looking for kids that would make good friends. I reached out to the mom of a friend she has at school that is a very sweet little girl — no playdates yet but maybe it will work out. Invites to Rocky Point go first to people with kids G would like.

When my friend Noel invited us all to be their guests in Flag during the Crazy 88, I was thrilled. Noel is super guy who I’ve enjoyed riding with about 10 times, and his blog and pics are so similar to my own I knew it would be a good fit all around:   kids and kids, parents and parents, lifestyle, anal-retentiveness, waking up pre-dawn to ride…     I doubted myself more than Beckie or Amy or Noel, or G.   but, G is the rodeo bull that is Genevieve…so we made a point to arrive at a sensible hour to let the kids bond and the parents unwind.

G had seen pics of Noel’s girl Gianna, and I tried to psych her up for the trip, to try to build a notion of a relationship with Noel’s kids so she would treat them more like friends instead of props.   She was inconsolable when she left her backpack at school, wailing about how it would affect the impression she would make.   The last half hour of the ride she   couldn’t wait to meet her new friends, and repeated their names over and over: Gianna and Aran.   G is a rodeo bull, but she is a smart, sweet little girl…I knew right here that short of another thunderstorm it would be a great weekend.

The details are superfluous, but the self-doubt I had after the butthurt-neighbors-experiment vanished completely.   It seemed so normal and so natural to treat all the kids like one bunch, and Noel and Amy so easy to make it all go.   When the kids were connecting, it was really great to watch.   Aran challenged G, G challenged Gianna, and they fed each other’s pretending.   Stumbling punchdrunk around the truck after the race, I couldn’t help smiling at how they wanted me to put them in the bed so they could pretend to be dragons playing in their spaceship.     Good friends, good children, good times.     There, I said it!   I genuinely enjoyed hanging out with the kids.   Even the ones who were not mine.   Even when I had to negotiate a truce to a soccer\hide&seek battle-of-wills.   Even when I had to negotiate a truce to stoked-boy-crashing-the-goal\little-tomboy-wants-to-learn-rules.   Even when the other G peed herself and I had to wipe a tinyButt that was not of my line.   It was weird, I knew what to do, it was just like G, but a different tinyButt.   I promised Noel when he left that the kids would all be alive and reasonably unfilthy when he returned.   Yeah me!

Hopefully their family will let us return the favor and come be our guests in Rocky Point soon.