By itself, not really an issue. I tell people to hurry up all the time. Ride to the store? Sure, make it quick. But 1) it wasn’t the same tone. Other kids have told Alex to be quick about stuff (and Alex has told other kids, too*) and it hasn’t bothered me in the slightest. He was being an asshole about it, probably compounded by that fact that 2) you’re still missing the part where, prior to coming around the corner and telling Alex to hurry up, he had already said TO ME, not another kid, that Alex and I “better hurry up”. If you want to think kids talking to other kids like assholes is just fine, that’s great and I probably wouldn’t disagree with you most of the time. But if you think there’s absolutely no issue whatsoever having a 9 year old tell an adult that they “better” do a damn thing, you’re crazy.
*I just asked Alex to retrieve a younger kid from the playground because I told her mother I’d bring her in. He was an asshole about it because of his tone. The same words probably would have been just fine if he hadn’t sounded like such an asshole. I’m sorry if you don’t realize that tone matters, but I still told Alex he was being a jerk about it.
I’ve talked to his grandma quite a bit. I feel terrible for her that he has to take care of him at her age. My own grandmother took care of a cousin from a young age and now that the girl is getting older (13 or 14), it’s getting harder and harder for my grandma to manage. So I understand if she’s a little absent from his life, in terms of teaching and discipline and being able to manage his behavior. The whole situation seems unfortunate both for her and the boy.
If Alex had said “I will give you my nice Vikings truck for your busted FedEx truck” and the other kid agreed to it, that’s one thing. The bad behavior is if the kid initiated the trade, which I know he did, and then used car salesmen tactics (fast-talking and trying to make a deal seem better than it is) to get Alex to along with it. I’m not sure he did that but it’s not just the Vikings truck, it seemed to me to a be a series of non-equal trades. Plus, like I said, Alex seemed to have fewer cars than when he started.
But that’s on Alex. I can stop future trading if I want to, but Alex lives with the trades he agreed to, even if I think they weren’t smart.
Dammit! I thought we were actually going to make it to 50 posts in a parenting thread before someone accused the OP of being a helicopter mom. :mad: Oh, well. Maybe next year.
Also, regarding this bad trade thing, the analogy of you trading me some junk and in return getting something worthwhile is not a good analogy, because in that scenario we are basically of equal competence. When you are talking about a 9-year-old and a 7-year-old, and the 9-year-old is consistently coming out on top, that is an uneven situation and IMO it is the parent’s job to step in and make sure their 7-year-old doesn’t lose all his best toys just because he’s not good at avoiding being manipulated by a kid that is 2 years older than him.
Oh, bullshit. A helicopter parent would have swooped in and made them trade back and then told the kids they couldn’t play together anymore. I’m bitching about an asshole neighbor kid on the internet. Are you fucking high? Oh, and on your edit: Seriously? “Stay out of it”? I’m not “in it.” I made a thread on a message board. Please tell me how that is helicopter parenting or not “staying out of it.”
:rolleyes:
Does it count if the person making the claim can’t read? Because I’m not sure Wilbo can, not for comprehension anyway.
Well I am crazy, but that’s a different discussion entirely. The part about him telling you you’d better hurry up is the only thing here that smells of the kid being a little shit more so than other kids. The rest just sounds like normal stuff, and I suspect (and am willing to admit I could be wrong considering I wasn’t there) that you interpreted his tone differently than I would have because you already don’t like the kid, so everything he does rubs you the wrong way.
Drat! Is it too late? I was going for the random caps look, but secret codes are much better.
I only started really not liking him yesterday. Before that he was just an annoying kid (and my own kid’s annoying so that’s not really enough to get me to not like you, you know?). The thing with the cars and then telling me we better not be long may have made his tone toward Alex seem more harsh than it was/than he intended. I am less inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt, but you’re not wrong; it’s possible. It doesn’t give him a pass on what he said to me though because, regardless of tone, kids don’t tell adults what to do. It’s bullshit and enough, all by itself, to make me not like this kid. And it’s probably not his fault but that’s not really my problem.
The friend sounds annoying, but you seem to be looking for reasons to find him deficient/raised wrong/sneaky etc…
For example, it would not have occurred to me to ask the parents about my friend’s schedule.
Also, I have done several of the same things the friend is doing that annoy you - whispering, visiting at a window if I saw a friend, ‘hurry up!’ in front of an adult etc… I would not be trying to be disrespectful, but I was *shy *of adults, and only felt comfortable enough with my friends to be my loud, obnoxious kid self.
Kids don’t always realize they are being rude. shrug
Maybe he had a bad day yesterday. Sometimes nine year olds do. Nine year olds are not necessarily attuned to tone in their voice (you should hear nine year old girls - if you don’t have any. Bossy, bitchy and mean, its amazing any of them will play with any of the other ones).
Bad trades are part of childhood. Let them learn. Its a matchbox truck. Far better to learn about bad trades over a matchbox truck.
Kids giving you ultimatums (and your parents ultimatums) are also part of the deal. The number of times “if you don’t ______, I won’t be your friend” is uttered is amazing. I come down hard on my own kids if I hear it, but if I hear it from someone else’s kid I just talk about the inconsistencies of friendship with my own. Next time you get lip back, pull a parent “I’m sorry, Alex needs to go to the store with me and we will be on my schedule, because I’m the mom. I’m not shopping on a time schedule for your convenience.” Yes, we’ve actually pulled phrases like that on our kid’s friends - and while nine year olds often don’t have awareness of their own tone, most of them have dealt with enough parents and teachers to get “voice of authority.”
(Play poker with your son - and cheat. Shortly will come the teenage card sharks. Teach him to defend himself rather than worry about this one kid. Cause there are a lot of this one kid out there - and they turn into your coworkers and your bosses. The kid certainly sounds annoying, but unless you think he is going to lead your son into danger, treat his acquaintance as a learning experience.).
Now don’t be jumping down my throat and all. You started this thread for honest feedback and you’ve been around long enough to know that posters here will be happy to oblige.
Without a point-by-point analysis of your actions, they do seem to suggest that you the parent are choosing who your kid is going to be friends with.
I know, I know, you’ve plenty of arguments to the contrary but if that isn’t one of the founding principles of the Helicopter Parent Club, it’s got to be in the top two.
I really think this is very specific to my area. I was talking to a woman who just moved in yesterday but who is still from around here, and she also has friends of her kids ask her permission for things. I asked her because you guys make it seem like it’s totally unheard of but it’s normal for me because I grew up never asking my friends themselves if I could spend the night but instead asking their parents. If I was talking with a friend about them staying over for dinner and I said “Sure, if my parents say it’s okay…” they were the ones to ask my parents, not me. If Alex wants to go hang out at, you know, Billy’s or whatever, I tell him to go and ask Sue (the mama), not Billy, if it’s okay. (Ha, this just happened. “Mom, can I go to Kid’s House?” “Sure, go ask Kid’s Mom.”)
So I’ll let that slide as regional and assume the kid/his guardians aren’t from around here. It’s funny, this didn’t “upset” me necessarily, it was just unusual and annoying and One More Thing about this kid that bothers me and I included it because I honestly expected gasps of horror at the idea. I need a local coffee shop and a group of local moms who will better appreciate my disdain when kids break local social conventions that nobody else has ever heard of.
nods I liked your whole post. Just thought I’d mention that since I’m here anyway.
How? I haven’t stepped in and said they couldn’t be friends, nor have I discouraged Alex from playing with him (they’re outside right now). I also have no real intention of doing that as things stand now; if I see the kid bullying Alex somehow, or if Alex says he is, I’ll re-evaluate that but, for now, Alex is free to be friends with this kid as long as he likes.
The only kid I didn’t want Alex to play with is the God kid and even then I never told him he couldn’t, though it seems they’ve drifted apart naturally these days. I haven’t seen that kid for a while.
As a non-parent, I’m not going to give you any parenting advice, so don’t worry.
But I do have a question: Does this kid live close enough to you that he can monitor you and your son’s comings and goings from his own family’s property? If not, I do find it kind of strange that a 9-year-old kid is waiting around your house for you to get back from the store, or hanging outside ready to pounce when you take the garbage out.
He might have a really crappy home life and either doesn’t want to go back to his own house or is being actively encouraged to stay away. I feel kind of bad for him.
I never asked the parent, my friends and I would try to arrange things, and then we would ask our own parent. “Can I stay at Debbie’s house tonight? Her mom says it’s okay with her.” but I’m from the Midwest (Chicago) and people where you’re from may do things differently. To approach a parent would have been odd, and very Eddie Haskell-ish.
I am a helicopter parent, and I have to say your rotors are starting to turn.
These types of threads are about self-reflection more than anything.
I agree that the kid sounds like an obnoxious little twerp but he certainly isn’t posing any real danger which you acknowledge.
But it seems to stretch the edges of credulity if you’re not imposing this opinion with the hope that it will influence Alex into dropping him as a friend.
I know others will chime in with “Well that’s what parents are supposed to do” but this is where the debate sets off into the how-much-is-too-much? territory.
You sound very secure in defining your role as a parent and appear more than level-headed. I’m sure the differing opinions you’ve received are food for thought.
FWIW, in my childhood, I didn’t talk to adults. If I wanted to make plans with my friends, I’d tell them what I want and they’d talk to their parents. It’s possible that the kid is the same way and that’s what the whispering is about. I’d never say “Can Bobby come out to play?”, but instead “Bobby, ask your Mom if you can come out to play.”
I have no idea who Eddie Haskell is, you guys. A character on Leave it to Beaver, I get that, but having never seen him in action, I don’t have idea what you are trying to get at.
It is odd. They are kind of behind and diagonal from us. This is why I mention the persistent knocking, the constant “Are you done yet? How about now? Now?”, etc., because it’s all fits into pattern of overbearing, obnoxious behavior and, for me (and maybe Eddie Haskell, I don’t know) it’s rude on top of it.
I hate to do the whole “Kids these days…” thing, especially considering I’m not even 30, but is this really typical kid behavior now?
Eddie was unfailingly polite to Mr. and Mrs. Cleaver, to the point of ridiculousness.
But when the parents weren’t around, he was a jerk and a bully. I think your little neighbor is nowhere near mature enough to be this duplicitous.
Are we really sure it’s such a bad trade? With kids that age, it’s all about getting something “new.” He was probably bored w/ his Vikings truck and thought the FedEx truck looked pretty neat. Thinking back to my 7-year old self, I could see making that trade no matter how much I liked the Vikings and big trucks.
Did he complain about the trade to you before you said anything about the equity of the deal? How does he feel about it now that he knows that you think it was a bad trade?
It could be that he was perfectly fine w/ the trade but now feels a bit of embarrassment/regret due to your reaction after the fact. You popped his cute little Fed Ex balloon, in other words.
Or maybe your son knew that Favre was retiring so he wanted to unload his Vikings gear asap.
I always love it when people start a thread and ask for advice and when it doesn’t match up to their predetermined view they get all pissy!!
Right here, when you said:
Let your kid work out his own problems. Don’t go SEC on him and stop his trading just because you think he’s getting a raw deal. These are things that kids have to learn themselves.
