Chapter 12

Wise men don't need advice. Fools won't take it.

~Benjamin Franklin

I love shopping and I'm really observant.

Often times, I just zone out at gatherings and just watch people. There's just something so interesting about observing people in their element.

I was in the jewelry section of Loehmman's when a young girl tripped. She was running around, screaming but as a true New Yorker, I was able to ignore her shrieks. However, once she tripped I snapped out and was concerned. When a child falls, you wait for those longest seconds to see whether the child reacts with laughter or cry of death. This rugrat got up and resumed her running as if nothing happened.

She only had one shoe on and her older sister stepped on a stocking. Another bystander told the girl to be careful but this wild child wasn't having it. Once this bystander commented to the child, out comes the mom. The bystander, white perhaps American woman, was telling this mother how it's dangerous for the little girl to be running around especially in her stockings. And this is where it gets interesting.

The mother of European descent in a thick accent explains to this American woman that she cannot control her three and a half year old daughter. She states she cannot yell at her or beat her. The American woman was puzzled and replied to the lady "What?! I'm not going to get in to this but you are the parent, she has to listen to you."

This mother goes on to explain that there's nothing she can do for this child, she just allows her to do whatever she wants and if she gets hurts then she'll learn.

As all this is going on, I'm hiding behind the sunglasses eavesdropping thinking what I would've done with this kid.

Everyone has their two cents on how a child should be raised. Do I agree with this nut case of a mom? Absolutely not but I'm not going to give her a lecture on parenting in the middle of Loehmann's. The poor mother looked disheveled, exhausted and defeated. Who knows what she's going through? Do we just fault the child for being in that "difficult stage" or fault the mother for poor parenting? What do we even coin as "good parenting", a relative term?

Lesson Learned: Sometimes it's best to just ignore what's going on around you. As many good intentions you have, we have to learn when is an appropriate time to dish out advice and how receptive the audience is.