Mean Girls

We don't get much playtime on weekday evenings; but what we had, on Wednesday evening, we decided to spend outside. It was sunny and warm if below seasonal and after spending so much of our days indoors I feel it's important to get out. I was blowing bubbles and Frances was catching them when C appeared, running with a gang of big-kid friends. "C!" Frances shouted. My heart sank; I know some of these kids, they are not kind. Among them is the little girl with the curly hair always jammed under a cap who manages to give off the impression of a Dickens' street urchin without any of the charm or innocence. When C is with the little girl with the curly hair, she never wants to play with Frances. "C!" Frances ran over and started talking excitedly about the big bottle of bubbles her Mummy got, and maybe she would like to play?

The little girl with the curly hair said, loudly, "She can't play with us. She's too slow." She mimed a sprint; "She can't run." The other kids left on their feet or their bikes and Frances was alone; she came back.

"C won't play with me."

"Oh no?"

"The girl with the curly hair said I'm too slow."

"How do you feel about that?"

"Sad."

"Do you want a hug?"

She nodded, and I cuddled my girl on my lap. "Slow. Well that's just silly."

"I'm not slow! I'm fast!"

"No, you're not slow; you're just little. The other kids are bigger, that's all."

She burrowed her head against me. The little girl with the curly hair walked over carrying her bright pink Bratz basketball; I hadn't previously known such a thing existed. The little girl with the curly hair's eyes are deeply crossed. This is a fact that would normally be insignificant, except that Frances's eyes too would be deeply crossed--if she weren't wearing her glasses. She has glasses, and she wears them. The little girl with curly hair does not, and I found myself wondering if she doesn't have any, if her parents can't afford them or if they don't care or if no one makes her wear them; I found myself wondering if I should feel compassion for the little girl with curly hair, but at the moment, I couldn't do it. She was the little girl who hurt my little girl. I wanted her to hurt.

She grinned at me. I glared.

"It's fun to knock on doors and run away," she said.

"Actually, that's very rude," I replied.

She heaved her basketball in the direction of my front door; it banged off a wall and lay on the ground a short ways away from us. She stared at me impudently, expecting what? A laugh, a smile, a grimace? I stared at her calmly; she ran away, leaving her ball behind her. Though I am only assuming that it is her ball, that she didn't just pick it up somewhere.

My little girl and I went inside and upstairs and after she got into her jammies, we had a long talk about why people say mean things. I tried to tell her that it's the mean people, not the people they're talking about. That it's normal to be hurt and sad, but in the end you have to realize that mean people don't make good friends, and that good people who make good friends will not say mean things that hurt you and make you sad. That it's important to find those good people, and not worry too much about what the mean people say, because the mean people are mean to everyone. It's hard to find the words. She's only four, how much can she understand?

When she's a little bit older I'll try to explain that sometimes the mean people are really very sad, and that they don't care about other people because no one cares about them; but right now all I care about is that she knows how worthless the words are.

We read Stella Fairy of the Forest on the big bed and I walked her back to her room and tucked her in, and we talked about the fun things we did that day--something I am trying to do with her like my 3 Things book. She liked blowing bubbles, and oddly, she liked talking about mean people. I asked her how she was feeling.

"Sad," she said.

"Oh? Why sad?"

"Because," she said morosely. "Because it was a fun day and it's hard to say goodbye to a fun day when it's night time."

So there may or may not be a Girls Staying Up Late Party when I am on vacation with her in July. There may be snacks, and movies, and waiting until it's dark before we go to bed. Frances wants to invite some friends. Stay tuned.

Posted by Andrea at May 29, 2008 7:21 AM under Being Small , Friends and Others

EMAIL this entry

(comments fields are below this section)